The Dark Whirlpool of Konoha
by addamp53
Summary: After the Sasuke retrieval mission Jiraiya tells Naruto straight up that he will only be trained in using the Kyuubi's chakra and that he has to give up on rescuing Sasuke. Naruto refuses and sets his indomitable will and determination on becoming a powerful shinobi his own way.
1. Chapter 1

Three years, three years before Sasuke would be taken over by Orochimaru and become nothing more than a husk. He would no longer be the brother-rival that Naruto had come to know; merely imaging Orochimaru's twisted grin warping the Uchiha's face caused Naruto to retch.

This had all happened because he wasn't strong enough, he had tried his best to bring his brother back, even tapping into the Kyuubi's chakra and using his strongest jutsu, the Raseangan. It had all been for naught as even in brute strength the curse-enhanced Uchiha had outdone him and shoved his lightning covered fist through Naruto's chest.

The blond was lying in the hospital covered in bandages, if it hadn't been for Kyuubi's regenerative powers he was sure even Tsunade wouldn't have been able to fix him in time. He had just finished having a drag out fight with his god-father Jiraiya, the white haired man had been animate that he abandon trying to save Sasuke for a few years and focus solely upon using the Kyuubi's chakra.

That was another source of the blonde's anguish, when he had told the old pervert that he didn't need the Kyuubi to be a great ninja Jiraiya, growing more and more frustrated, had told the blond that he was wrong. He had come out and told Naruto that with the exception of his fight with Kiba, Naruto hadn't won a single fight without having to rely upon the Kyuubi.

_Flashback_

"_God damn it Naruto, listen to yourself! Every fight you've ever won has been because of using the Kyuubi's powers; you beat that girl named Haku because you used the Kyuubi. Against Orochimaru you used the Kyuubi's chakra to defeat his snake summon. Kiba you only won because of a lucky fart, for god's sake! Without Kyuubi you wouldn't have been able to open your chakra points after that Neji closed them in the chunin exams. You're fight with Kabuto was a draw and that was only because he played with you so long that you surprised him! Then even with the Kyuubi you couldn't defeat Sasuke and force him to go back to the village, he trounced you because you couldn't draw on enough of its power."_

_Naruto's eyes had flashed red, he had flinched as every point of his own incompetence was laid out in front of him by his own godfather. "Why don't you just come out and tell me that I'm worthless as a shinobi, you don't want me, and you just want to use me for the Kyuubi's power!"_

"_Well face it Naruto you don't have anywhere near the skill to face Orochimaru, don't even start thinking about Akatsuki."_

_Tears had started streaming down the blonds face, "Then teach me Ero-sennin, teach me like the Third taught you, you don't have a fuzz-ball sealed in you and yet you were able to send Itachi and Kisame running!"_

_The tall white haired sage had crossed his arms with a determined look on his face, "I'll only train you if you promise to give up on Sasuke and to let me teach you how to use the Kyuubi's chakra."_

_The blond had merely sat there for several long minutes, his blond hair hung like a curtain, hiding his blues eyes from a world that he seemingly didn't want to see._

"_No."_

"_What did you say?"_

_The sea of blond hair raised as the young ninja rose to face his godfather," No, I will not give up on Sasuke and I will not use the Kyuubi's chakra. If you aren't willing to help me, I'll learn on my own. I will use every resource in this village and become a shinobi that the world has never seen."_

_His eyes remained light blue but colored by a spark of determination that showed the world that nothing would deter the blond from this path._

Jiraiya had left after that, telling the blond to have Tsunade contact him when he was willing to become a real shinobi and stop being a foolish child. Jiraiya had then left the village to manage his spy network but left a toad behind with the Hokage, if she needed to recall him.

**Several Days Later**

Despite his argent protests Naruto had been forced to stay in the hospital and strapped down by Tsunade after the blonde's third escape attempt. The blond, having wanted to get out as soon as possible, walked out of the hospital at dawn, pink just starting to surge across the sky, banishing the darkness of the previous night.

Naruto had thought along and hard while in the hospital about the things he needed to learn and how he would acquire it without Ero-sennin. The sage would've been a font of knowledge but he had sworn an oath that he would not keep relying upon Kyuubi to do all his fighting for him, that he wouldn't cripple himself by having to use the beast's chakra. From now on the fox's chakra was off limits and he would grow strong without the old perverts help.

Walking through the village was strangely comforting at this time of day, the average citizen was still asleep, unable to glare at him or whisper behind his back, the village was empty of the living, leaving the quietness a blanket fallen upon the sleeping populous. He was able to walk through parts of the village he usually avoided, the venders shops worn by age and time, boarded up for the night, the market place was quiet and the silence welcomed him far more than the hustle and bustle ever had.

Not many had ever seen behind his mask enough to know but the blond had always preferred the silence to noise, not to say he didn't enjoy people, what type of attention starved orphan wouldn't like people. He merely liked a quiet conversation over tea, the problem with that being a calm and collected Naruto, hell any type of Naruto that wasn't stupid and perpetually happy would anger the villagers, so he had simply adopted the facade that seemed to anger them the least.

The glares and heated whispers had nothing on the weekly beatings he had gotten before adopting his mask. The healing the Kyuubi gave him was the only reason that he wasn't permanently disfigured by his 8th birthday.

The blond ninja looked up and found himself staring at tall support columns made of granite, beyond them stood a red wall with a single pair of double doors and a plague, the plague read simply Konoha Public/Shinobi Library. He had been here once before as a young kid seeking shelter from a thunder storm. The old bat in there had chased him off with her cane, forcing him back into a storm that was later coined storm of the century. Naruto smirked wryly as he considered that day; _I suppose life wasn't interesting enough for me without having to dodge lightning. _He glanced down at the first sized hole in his orange jumpsuit, _I guess I'm out of practice_.

The whiskered shinobi walked forward and passed the columns, when he passed the column he was a small malnourished blond, when he walked out the other side he was a stocky brown haired chunin with hazel eyes. Entering the Library he took the time to look around, there were thousands of books, shelves upon shelves, the colors blending together into patterns that defied order and reason.

The now brown haired man walked up to the help desk, "excuse me miss, could you possibly direct me to the shinobi training section?"

The young blond who had been at the desk stood up smoothing out her plaid skirt as she blushed slightly, "Of course Shinobi-san, I'll show you personally."

A few minutes later, the young blond woman was scurrying out of the shinobi section with a smile and deep blush. The genin turned chunin nodded content with himself after he dropped his fake smile when the blond was out of sight, cultivating a good standing relationship with her might serve to allow him to gather information or bend some of the rules to better suit his needs.

He knew his weaknesses, he had purposefully not tried too hard to improve, it wasn't that he didn't try, it was merely a lack of focused intent. A strong 'demon' would bring on more anger by the villagers, so his work was lack luster. He had actually taken to writing as plots development was something he could think about while pretending to be working hard in front of the numerous sensei.

When Kakashi had come around he had been willing to work hard but the man wasn't interested in training them in anything but teamwork. Next had been Jiraiya and for once the blond was taught a technique and didn't let himself get distracted, he had learned the Raseangan in a record breaking month as where it had taken the old pervert a year.

Now however, he had a reason to get stronger. Jiraiya's message had indeed pounded home, holding himself back and pretending to be stupid wasn't helping him to win battles, without the Kyuubi he would be dead from any one of the opponents he had faced so far.

The disguised blond slowly walked through the training section, _first should be Taijutsu as I don't actually have a style yet._

Several hours were spent looking through the various Taijutsu styles, after reading each one he would create a single disguised shadow clone with that style in mind and send it to a training ground to experiment with the style before dispelling to inform the original of the 'feel' of the style. Goken, the style Lee and Gai used, was a hard hitting style relying upon great feats of strength and speed but he merely wasn't comfortable using such a straight forward style.

There were numerous other clan styles that were kept in public record, Naruto soon figured out exactly why the generic versions of clan Taijutsu weren't kept secret, the blond couldn't use them at all. They weren't a matter of strength or speed, his body just wasn't built for the movements the styles required, it was like asking a lumber jack to do a ballerina's dance. The attempt could be made with practice but no true progress could be made on that path.

Dozens of Taijutsu styles but none of them felt right, the blond was beginning to feel pressured to try to find another teacher, but as is he didn't want to go to a teacher with his paltry skills. In frustration the genin slapped his hand down on a Taijutsu style, subconsciously channeling a small amount of chakra through his hand he watched in amazement as the letters of the style rearranged themselves forming new words, "Whirlpool Style."

The more Naruto read the more entranced he got by this style, it seemed to call to him and address all of his skills with the perfect fit. He grabbed the scroll, letting the chakra flow from his hands stop and watched the Whirlpool style once more hide behind a generic Taijutsu style.

As much as the blond wanted to run out the door and use chakra enhanced leaps to a training field to try this style he restrained himself. The mask of impulsiveness and idiotic happiness was fake but after acting for so long it became hard to not act by instinct. Naruto spent the rest of the day looking over Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Fuinjutsu, Kenjutsu, Health books and several scrolls on the preparing of herbs as both medicine and poison. Naruto knew that if he was going to take on a sannin, quite literally one of the strongest shinobi in the world alive, that he couldn't afford to over specialize. Being a specialist allows you to become predictable and easy to counter.

The sky was beginning to darken when Naruto finally stepped out of the library, stars beginning to poke through the dark blue of the sky. Hanging from the blonde's shoulders was a satchel stuffed to overflowing with scrolls and books. Upon his face was a look few ever saw on him inside the village, gone was the hyperactive knucklehead and in its place was a calm, determined and intelligent shinobi with a cause.

He didn't know it but others would notice this change and years later look back upon it as the day Naruto Uzumaki became Konoha's Dark Whirlpool.


	2. Chapter 2

Training by yourself is a lot like hiking up a mountain, if you don't have a plan and start off running you'll just end up stuck on a cliff exhausted and freeze to death. So Naruto decided to start his days training an asset that had been sadly ignored and even tarnished after years of little use, his mind. The blond got up at 4 o'clock in the morning and went for an hour jog around the village to wake up before changing clothes, adopting a henge, and walking towards the village's park.

It wasn't that big, just some small rolling hills around a pond with a playground off in one corner, but what he was here for didn't take much room. Walking up one hill he came upon a bunch of tables with old men sitting around them, he had seen them before and found out through Kakashi that this is where old men went to play games such as Go, Shogi, and some westernized game called Chess. The silver haired Jounin had explained that these were all kinds of strategy games and had even suggested Naruto try taking them up so he could learn to focus more, well this would be the first time Kakashi had given the blond anything of value.

He waited for an old man's opponent to leave then asked politely if he could play a game. The old man, covered in bandages, with an arm in a sling, and wearing a blue robe merely grunted and waved his good arm at the opposite chair.

When the disguised Naruto had explained that he didn't actually know how to play any of the games the old cripple was visibly annoyed but calmed himself, "Young people today, too much time spent on learning to use all the muscles except the one that counts!" He tapped his finger against his temple to illustrate his point but then sighed and contented to teach Naruto how to play the games.

The blond took to Go surprisingly well, probably do to the lack of rules, but still got trounced by the old man who didn't even seem to be trying. Shogi went remarkably worse as the old man seemed a master at manipulating everything on the board, whether they were his pieces or not, and without Naruto even knowing he was being manipulated. By the time chess came around the blonde's brain was working harder than it ever had, trying to memorize every detail and put himself in the old man's shoes to be able to tell what he would do next.

His opponent explained that what he was doing could be described as a sort of empathy, putting yourself in your opponents shoes was a more practical form, in his opinion, of the emotional understanding of another. They talked for long hours with game after game going by as Naruto grew to enjoy being tutored by the old man, his remarks were snide sometimes but only about Naruto's lack of experience and age, not about his intelligence as had been a great manys' go to insult with the young blond.

Naruto looked up at the soon and realized that it was about 9 o'clock and the stores he wanted to visit would now be open, he was reluctant to leave since this old man was the first to be able to teach him without being distracted by women, uninterested, or have 20 other kids to teach. However, he had a job to do, he needed to get stronger, and he couldn't let himself get sidetracked by simple things such as the desire of a friendly conversation over a game of chess stop him.

His crippled opponent watched Naruto as he struggled with the decision to leave but when the choice was made he let out a small smile, barely noticeable and only for a second, as the blond said he had to leave to train and asked if he would be willing to play again tomorrow. The old man merely nodded as if he knew the question had been coming since the blond sat down.

Right as Naruto was about to leave he realized his atrocious manners and bowed slightly to the elder, "I'm sorry all this time and I never got your name."

The old cripple frowned and replied in his deep gravelly voice, "It's polite to introduce yourself first, boy. And drop that Henge, this is an shinobi-strategy club, you're not fooling anyone."

Naruto shot back up and his feet started to spread in a combat stance before he stopped himself and prayed that his new friend wouldn't disown him once he knew, with a sigh, Naruto disrupted the chakra construct around himself and revealed his blond head and malnourished body to the world.

He bowed again seriously, "My name is Uzumaki Naruto and it's a pleasure to have played with you."

The old man, surprisingly, bowed his head to the young shinobi, "I am Shimura Danzo, I will be here tomorrow morning at 4."

Naruto's head shot up, as if it had been launched out of a cannon, as he looked at the old man then smiled and turned before running back into town.

Naruto's face was stretched slightly as he smiled brightly, someone old enough to know about the Kyuubi accepted him even after catching him in a lie, he accepted him and wanted to keep playing tomorrow!

Naruto stopped in the dark alley beside a weapons shop he had heard Sasuke talking about once, and since the teme wouldn't settle for anything but the best, it followed that the shop was the best in the village. Slowly going through hand seals he before his hands stalled before the last seal, _Most shops in the village that service shinobi are ex-shinobi themselves, If I go in there and they catch me under a Henge like Danzo-san did I might get thrown out_. Naruto let go of the seals and allowed the built up chakra to flow smoothly back into his system.

Drawing in a deep breath, much like a first timer about to jump off a diving board, he walked out of the alley and into the street, immediately he could feel the glares focus on him as he was noticed. Unlike he always had before he had no intention of letting the ignorant villagers tarnish his mood, although he had never shown it before the glares were constantly wearing away at his mask, always eating away at his psyche as he developed a 6th sense about when someone was looking at him and their emotions when they did, turning to the source of the glares he met their eyes one at a time until they looked away. Naruto scoffed, _Cowards, only willing to show their hatred when I sit there and take it, first sign of resistance and they fold_.

Naruto turned off the street and opened a door, setting off a small bell causing him to flinch, stepping inside he let his eyes sweep across the shelves. There were aisles made of wood each stacked with different weapons and ninja equipment, everything from sandals to bins full of ore, prepared to be made into new weapons. Utilizing the same skills that had allowed him to paint the Hokage Monument Naruto slowly walked the aisles checking all of the store's wares. Shuriken, Kunai, swords, javelin, ninja wire, replacement headbands and numerous weapons that he didn't even understand, they were certainly extensive in their variety if nothing else.

Walking past a wall holding Bo-staffs Naruto came across what he was looking for, swords, the book he had read said that the style he would use would rely upon the sword he chose. The problem with that being that he had no idea what type of sword would fit him. Sighing he trudged to the back of the store where the counter would be, prepared for all the bigotry the village had shown him, when he walked around the last shelf his jaw dropped as he saw the familiar twin bunned hair style of the self-proclaimed weapons specialist of Konoha, Tenten.

The brown haired kunoichi looked up and found the orange clothes form of Naruto standing in her father's shop. "Hey, aren't you that kid from the Chunin exams? Yeah you beat Neji, never would've seen that coming, no offense."

The blond merely shrugged, "None taken, that was the general consensus. I even heard that Kakashi placed a bet against me if I made it to the end and had to fight Sasuke."

Tenten looked flustered for a moment, _How could a Sensei make a bet like that about his own students!_

Fortunately her hands were behind the counter so Naruto never saw them shaking as her fingernails bit into her palm. Taking a deep breath and exhaling slowly she looked back up at Naruto, "So Naruto-san what is it you were looking for today?"

The blond cocked his head to the side, he had seen the slight tremors in her forearms and watched as the muscles flexing under her skin moved her sleeves but merely shrugged it off, she didn't seem hostile to him and that's all he cared about at the moment. "Just Naruto is fine, formalities make my head hurt. I was looking for a sword actually, I'm interested in taking up Kenjutsu and I'm not sure what type would fit me. I figured that you could help me to find one that fitted me and could work as I grow."

Tenten nodded her head as Naruto spoke, "Firstly, and I don't mean any offense here, but are you sure you're not already as tall as you're going to get? Some people are just naturally shorter."

Naruto nodded, he could see how it might look that way for people who didn't know his life. "I see what you mean, but recently I have taken to reading and discovered through a health book that my diet has been the cause of my inherit lack of stature. I was a bit of a cheapskate growing up and refused to spend much money on any food other than ramen. I am acting to rectify this situation presently and expect a growth spurt within the next few months."

Tenten was standing stock still, she had always thought the blond genin was kind of a simpleton, since when did he start using words like inherit, or stature, or rectify.

The truth was that the reason Naruto didn't buy other food was that he couldn't, he would often be thrown out of grocery stores the second he entered and restaurants were no better, the only place that allowed him to eat in the village was Ichiraku Ramen, so it became a staple of his diet.

The weapons specialist shook herself and latched back onto the present, "Well, do you have a Taijutsu style that you'll be incorporating the sword into?"

The blond momentarily stilled, _Should I tell her about the Whirlpool style? There's no promise that she won't be an enemy someday, I should just give hints_.

"I'm learning a new style that incorporates high speed, with light attacks building up to overpowering finishers."

Tenten merely raised her eyebrow, "Well that doesn't tell me much, but I'd say what you need is Jian."

With that said she walked over to the sword wrack and pulled off a particular sword that sat silently in a black sheath, the pommel was simple dark leather wrapped around it with a stylized red swirl on the bottom. She handed it to Naruto who tentively pulled it out and examined the blade. It was about 70 centimeters long and maybe 4 centimeters wide, two bladed and a strange black hue instead of the usual silver color metal takes when forged. (It's Sokka's sword from Avatar the Last Airbender).

Naruto looked back up to the brown eyed kunoichi, "It's light."

She merely nodded, "Yes, it's a part of the forging process that made it lighter than other swords of the kind."

A sad sigh left Naruto's lips, "Sadly this sword can't work, I said my style relied upon overwhelming power in the finishing moves."

Tenten merely smirked, "Channel some chakra into it."

The blond raised an eyebrow and did as he was told, suddenly the sword's weight increased exponentially and sliced through the air, and then the floor, until Naruto got a grip on it and stopped channeling chakra.

Tenten merely let out a bark of laughter, "I meant just a little bit of chakra, there is a weight increasing seal on the pommel, the more chakra you put into it the heavier it will get. It also has more seals on it that can detect elemental chakra, if you pump regular chakra into it it'll increase in weight but if you put elemental chakra it will react the same as any other chakra conductive metal."

Naruto nodded, this was a lot better than he thought, a frown erased the smile on his lips, "How much does this cost?"

"750,000 yen."

The blond visibly flinched, it wasn't completely out of his ability to pay but it would take a serious chunk out. A sharp look entered his eyes, turned out actually using his brain this morning had more of an effect than he thought, "How about you let me have it for 500,000 and I'll write it in my will, if I die the sword will return to you. If I don't I'll become a famous shinobi and it'll become known as my trademark weapon, brining your store more business."

Tenten huffed, "What if you don't become a famous shinobi?"

Naruto wracked his brain for a good response and settle for a compromise, "How about if a year from now I'll pay another 250,000 if I'm not famous or dead."

"Fine, but I'll decide what defines 'famous'."

Naruto paid happily for his new acquisition, it would fit perfectly with the Whirlpool Style. He gave the young weapons specialist a nod and turned to leave.

"Naruto, as long as you're here, might I suggest you get a new outfit." She said looking at his torn and stained orange jumpsuit. "I'll even help you choose the clothes."

Naruto didn't know why but for some reason he froze at the thought of a woman clothes shopping for him and started to whimper while holding his frog wallet.

**Author's notes:**

**I'm going to bring Tenten in as a training partner and to teach him how to handle a sword, she'll become a reoccurring character. I don't know if there will be any sort of love interest here and will let you guys vote on that. Danzo's introduction was really kind of a spur of the moment thing but I think I like how its going so far. Danzo is supposed to be about Hokage level so I might make him willing to help train Naruto a little.**

**I'm not sure if there will be any love interest in this story but if any of you have any ideas for pairings you should tell me and I'll consider them. Thanks for reading and Please review with any ideas you have!**


	3. Chapter 3

Tired is a sort of abstract concept, some say they are tired after a long day's work, some say they are tired after a particularly fast pace game of basketball, if these definitions of 'tired' work then Naruto wasn't tired, Naruto was freaking exhausted.

The first thing Tenten had insisted he buy was weights, she had said that her teammate and sensei used weights and as a result had become scary fast. He didn't know what he had gotten into until she had helped him strap on 100lb weights onto each ankle and 50lb weights onto each wrist and told him not to enhance his muscles with chakra. Even walking around the store with Tenten was a trial, each step felt like he was pulling his foot out of mud. It took 3 hours but the blond eventually made it out of the store wearing his new outfit as well as carrying several others.

All in all he was much happier with his new wardrobe, gone was the bright orange outfit that served to make him the most obvious target on the battlefield, he now wore a black vest with lots of pockets over a long sleeve maroon shirt. Black combat pants went down his legs and were taped tight and tucked into black leather combat boots. Over it all was a maroon trench coat with a black spiral on the center, between his shoulder blades.

After dropping off a majority of his purchases at his apartment Naruto grabbed some scrolls and a granola bar before hurrying off to a training ground 7. Just running to the training ground had left the blonde's unlimited stamina severely dented, he had his hands on his knees and was panting hard as sweat ran down his body. Quickly taking off his new coat and vest helped immensely. After catching his breath Naruto formed a cross with his fingers, "Kage Bunshin No Jutsu."

7 identical clones popped into existence, surrounded by their customary clouds of smoke, they turned as one and looked at the original. The only Naruto without his coat and vest merely cocked an eyebrow at the gathered clones, "You all know what my plan is, stop wasting time and do it."

The clones all nodded seriously and walked off before sitting by a tree and starting to talk. During his time at the hospital Naruto had thought about the training abilities of Kage Bunshin, at first he had thought that if he made as many clones as he could at a time then they would all learn the exercise he was doing at the same time and he would learn to do it that much faster, but the problem with that is they would learn it the exact same way.

His first plan was to make a hundred shadow clones and have them all do the tree walking or water walking exercise, but the problem with that is that all of the clones would have the exact same perspective once made and hence have the same ideas on how to do the exercise. Doing the same mistakes 100 times and learning the same lesson from it 100 times isn't a great training tool, but making say 5 clones and having them discuss how to do the exercise then each trying it in a different way would create different perspectives for each clone. Once each clone dispelled the original would keep that clones perspective in mind and create 10 more clones to continue that clone's training. As he did this for all of the clones he would gain training through different experiences and learn the lesson from each clone before making more clones to learn from their mistakes.

While his clones went off to discuss different ways to increase their chakra control the original started running laps around the clearing, while clones could help with anything mental, physical strength and muscle memory could only be acquired through the original. As such Naruto started running laps, after an hour or so he flopped onto the ground covered in sweat and crawled slowly towards a small creek bordering the training ground. 3 feet from the edge of the water Naruto ran out of strength and lay boiling under the hot sun as it pounded onto his maroon and black clad frame. _Note to self; find a way to cool down_.

The water was so close, the blond laid there watching the cool refreshing water flow by, scenes from the battle with Zabuza drifted through his mind, how the missing-nin and Kakashi had made giant dragons out of water without ever touching it. Rolling onto his side Naruto sluggishly brought his hands together in the Bird seal, it had been the last one of that water dragon jutsu they had used, logic dictates that it was the one that brought movement to the water.

Closing his eyes he slowly started pushing his chakra in the direction of the water, at first when he reached it the water seemed to just flow around his water, as if it was a rock the water didn't want to interact with. Naruto tried to remember everything he had ever heard or thought about water, maybe it was a perspective problem, _water is smooth and cool, it flows around but also slowly wears away, it brings life to the dehydrated but can flood and kill. It is the element most closely related to giving life._

Naruto's muscles relaxed as he thought about the cooling element, it had such strength but it was seldom recognized for its power. As Naruto pondered the life giving element he didn't even notice as his chakra changed, water was slowly being sucked up through his extended chakra like through a straw until it came into contact with his fingers. As the cool water touched his fingers the blond let out a startled shutter in surprise and his concentration was lost, the first touch of water was followed by more as all the water held suspended in the air crashed down onto his overheated form.

Naruto sputtered and coughed much like his chakra was doing as a cold breeze raked along his now soaked body. He shivered as his body cooled and power returned to his brain, he hadn't actually expected that to work, it had more been exhausted musing than an honest attempt. Rolling onto his stomach and hauling his body into a sitting position the whiskered shinobi put his hands back into the Ox seal and slowly pushed his chakra back towards the water. He watched as the water rippled away from him as his chakra interacted with it, he tried to suck the water into his chakra like he did before but try as he might the water flowed around but not through his chakra.

Three hours later, the blond stood up with a sigh as he let his chakra sigh. As much as he wanted to continue trying to get the water to move, the most he had managed was to get it to start to bubble, but he simply didn't have time to continue wasting. Fortunately there was more than one of him, with crossed fingers Naruto again summoned kage Bunshin, 5 popped into existence, it seemed that the chakra control exercises he had his clones do earlier had paid off. He already knew seven different ways to do the tree and water walking exercises.

"Okay you 4, go out to different places and just observe how water moves for an hour, then come back here and try to get the water to move again. You go back to the library and read anything you can find on water manipulation and then disperse." The clones saluted and turned before running off into the trees towards the village.

Naruto walked over towards his bag and pulled out a few scrolls before making clones and passing them to each. "Okay guys, learn the jutsu in those scrolls and once you've got them down come at me with them. Try to sneak up on me and hit me with them, no lethal levels but other than that anything goes."

As the clones went to hide and study in the forest the original walked into the center of the clearing and pulled out his new sword before going through some basics of the whirlpool style and adding the sword into the movements. He was only doing the first four movements of the style at a time, an hour later he stabbed his sword into the ground and started going through the movements without the sword. Slowly his movements became more and more smooth and he flowed from one into the other even plucking his sword from the ground mid-movement and continuing through it until he was gracefully dancing through the movements as he faced imaginary opponents.

Suddenly a spear made of water racketed towards the blonde's back, having sensed the spear's approach he turned and neatly sliced it in half causing it to disperse and having the water splash all over him. A clone walked out of the trees smirking openly at the original, "Hey boss, guess what I found out." The clone's voice was positively singing with smugness as he quickly ran through hand seals bringing up three more water spears that slowly started to float around him.

The original merely smirked back, "That means if I beat you I get to learn how to move the water and how to use that jutsu even faster." The original settled into the starting stance of the whirlpool of the style. Turning to his side, to present a smaller target, he extended his left arm palm up towards the water wielding clone and his right away from the attacker before bending at the elbow holding the sword at the offending clone as he bent his legs and settled in. The clone ran through more hand seals and the first of 3 spears surged through the air at the other blond, the original stepped forward and to the side swinging his sword down to again bisect the incoming spear. This momentarily left him off balance as another spear tore through the air at his exposed back; leaning back he barely made it under the water jet as it sailed past his throat.

Using chakra to stick his feet to the ground kept Naruto from hitting the ground as he reached back and caught himself before pushing away to reach a standing position again and turning to face the clone.

He watched as the clone brought his hand along his remaining spear and seemed to bring his hand along its length, seemingly shaving it with his arm, after about 20 seconds instead of a spear the clone was surrounded by a dozen senbon made of water.

Bright blue eyes glowed with excitement, "I so have to learn that!" a slight tap of boot on dirt was the only warning Naruto got before being sliced in half by a clone wielding two swords made entirely of wind. The falling blond disappeared in a puff of smoke to reveal a log split cleanly through the middle. The real Naruto walked out of the timber and looked at the two smirking clones standing at the other end of the clearing, "Well this is going to suck." Although his mouth said the words his eyes spoke only of excitement at the challenge before him.

**Author's Notes**

**Obviously this isn't really the most exciting chapter and is merely one for the sake of training up Naruto's skills, I can't really just have him go from novice to Jounin level skill now can I? This is also there to start showing his budding affinities for both water and wind jutsu as he will have both strong affinities. Any reviews besides "too cliché" or hey are you dumb? Would be appreciated, remember if your reviewing even if I get something wrong you don't have to be a dick, tell me if I got something wrong and I'll fix it.**


	4. Chapter 4

Night had long since fallen by the time Naruto, bloodied and sore, stumbled into his apartment. He barely remembered to channel some chakra into his door before opening it, once on the other side he closed the rickety wooden door and examined the seal he had taped onto it. It wasn't a very advanced seal, actually one of the first the book had, its purpose was to set off a loud screeching sound if someone opened the door unless he channeled chakra into it first, later he would be able to make it only identify his chakra but for now that was way ahead of the blond. Nodding tiredly as he gazed at the seal he turned and walked over to his couch before flopping down onto it and quickly passing into the land of sleep.

**Four Months Later**

Training ground 7 was quiet, not even the birds dared speak, several figures vanished and reappeared around the clearing and in the surrounding trees. Blood splashed the ground as trees shattered, the river rose like a great beast of old, a gale of wind blew against the river knocking it off balance and it crashed down upon unsuspecting trees. In the middle of the clearing one figure stood calmly, blond spikey hair cascaded down to his shoulders, tan skin was pulled taught over smooth defined muscles, the blond stood at 5'11 with blue eyes closed but clearly moving beneath the eyelids.

This method of training was something that his Go partner had suggested he do, his problem was lack of experience, both in combat and strategies, so the training was to create two sets of four clones and have one squad henge into Leaf-nin and the other into Kumo-nin and have the squads form strategies on how to fight the other. After he made the Kumo-nin squad he would have them read a book he had gotten about how Kumo-nin fought and use this to plan their strategies, to make it more realistic and change the perspective of the clones to insure both teams didn't try the same thing.

Direct combat wasn't the only method of utilizing this training; the enactments also included escort details and point protection, such as guarding a bridge. By gaining experience on both sides of the conflict his mission experience increased greatly and allowed him practice in using jutsu and thinking strategically.

_I really should thank Danzo-Ojii-Sama for telling me about this._

Another clone dispelled and Naruto quickly sorted through its memories, flanking by using Shunshin still left him out in the open for too long, he had been trying to speed up the Shunshin for a while now and had yet to get fast enough. His wind blades still took the full number of hand seals but, Wind-style Great Breakthrough was now stronger than the original, being able to knock down medium sized trees.

Over the next several minutes clones continued to dispel as the battle waged, in the end it was the 'Kumo-Nin' who won the day but only with two members of the squad left. After the survivors had dispelled he was able to see why they had won, the 'Leaf-Nin' squad had tried a flanking attack but in doing so had fallen right into the 'Kumo-Nin' Squad's trap as they triggered several seals carved into the tree trunks.

A slight tensing of the bond's hand was all that heralded the arrival of an Anbu, cloaked in a tan overcoat and a tiger mask, "Hokage-sama has requested your presence Uzumaki-San."

The blond calmly nodded, "Thank you Anbu-san."

The brown haired Anbu nodded and disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

Naruto sighed as his shoulders relaxed, extending from each of his fingers were small tornados that could tear through armor or flesh, slowly they disappeared, with a gust of wind Naruto disappeared with a flap of his long coat.

**Hokage's Office**

Tsunade Senju was in a word, bored, being Hokage of the village was stressing, faking calm, anger at not being able to go into the field to help, and politics. Four months ago her old teammate Jiraiya had come to her asking her to order all the Jounin in the village to not train Naruto so, in his words "He would stop deluding himself and come to his senses about proper training for a Jinchuuriki."

Needless to say she had sent the old pervert flying through her window and over the village's outer wall. To think that her teammate, of all people, would deny his godson teaching based upon what he wanted to learn. She had of course kept an eye on the boy's training and in all honesty his progress amazed her, and beyond all of that is besides the occasional training question, he didn't go to any of the Jounin or even herself for teaching. He was getting everything from the Library and watching other shinobi train.

Regardless of her desire to see Naruto continue to grow stronger the council had demanded, that as a shinobi and asset of the village, Naruto be sent out of the village on missions. She had talked to her Anbu a moment after she found a suitable mission and sent them out to gather Kakashi, Naruto and Sakura.

The blond Hokage had taken on Naruto's teammate Sakura as an apprentice shortly after the Uchiha had left and the girl showed amazing promise, much the same way she had when she was that age. It was the almost perfect degree of chakra control and slow building of her chakra reserves that was going to make her great, she would never sling around massive jutsu like Naruto or Kakashi could but she was already well on her way to learning how to use Tsunade's strength techniques and had begun healing small injuries.

Kakashi was a source of worry for the young looking Hokage, after Sasuke's defection he had buried himself in missions; he blamed himself for not convincing the Uchiha to stay and then for not training Naruto well enough to stop him. She didn't understand why the silver haired Jounin didn't stay in the village and help Naruto to grow stronger, but then again, maybe Kakashi just wasn't the teaching type. She had read up on the 'training' he had given his team and, in all honesty, if it were anyone else they probably would've died going into the chunin exams so unprepared. All he had taught Naruto and Sakura was the tree climbing exercise, she couldn't even accuse him of favoritism, until the chunin exams he didn't teach Sasuke any better and even then it was only on orders of her Sensei the Third Hokage.

Tsunade sat up straighter as her door was pushed open with a cane, few people would be brave or stupid enough to open a kage's door without knocking; limping calmly through the door was her Sensei's old advisor and rival Danzo. Calmly she offered she offered the old cripple a nod, "Danzo-san."

The old shinobi bowed his head but his sharp brown eye never left those of the blond, "Hokage-sama."

She respected the old man, one didn't get to be known as the Yami of Shinobi without reason, but she knew that his method of protecting Konoha wouldn't always align with her own.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Danzo merely kept a calm gaze on the Hokage, he knew she definitely didn't think it was a pleasure for her to deal with him, but he was necessary and they both knew it.

"I understand that you're sending the Jinchuuriki on a mission, I also know that you don't have a four member for the squad."

Tsunade nodded, she would have to find his source for confidential information again, "I'm assuming you're here with a recommendation, otherwise you wouldn't be wasting my time."

The old cripple merely nodded and brought a folder out of his robe and tossed it onto the blonde's desk. Tsunade picked up the manila colored folder and opened it to be shown a picture of a pasty white kid with a bowl cut and a smile, so fake it angered her for a reason she didn't entirely understand. Typed out next to the picture were the pertinent pieces of information; Name: Sai, no last name. Age: 14. Main skills: Kenjutsu, Ninjutsu (specialized ink style). Secondary skills: Taijutsu, speed training, genjutsu, torture and interrogation. Mission Completion: D ranks-unknown, C ranks-15, B ranks-13, A ranks-4, S ranks-0.

"Quite the candidate, what I want to know is what his true abilities are? You would never give me an accurate record of one of your little 'root' ninja."

Danzo's frown deepened, he didn't like that it was being insinuated that he lied to the leader of his village often, it was true but he didn't like it being said, after all the Hokages didn't want to know what it was he did in the dark to keep Konoha safe.

"His skills would put him around high chunin to low Jounin, if he were in the regular shinobi forces."

Checking for physical ticks or any type of tell was useless, she knew that the man was every bit the shinobi she was, the only one stronger in the village was probably Jiraiya, he would only give away what he chose to. The mission could end up being difficult and the opposition might prove a challenge if she had misjudged her apprentice or Naruto's progress.

"Fine. Have him here in 5 minutes for a briefing." She closed the file and pushed it back across the desk to Danzo. The old shinobi used his good arm to grab the folder and tuck it back into his robe.

"He's already outside; merely call him when you're ready." With his piece said he turned and hobbled out of her office and disappeared after closing the door.

The blond sighed, Danzo obviously knew something he wasn't telling, was interested in the mission or was interested in Team 7 but she'd have better luck fighting the Sage of Six Paths than prying answers out of the old coot.

The door opened again and a head covered in pink hair poked out from behind it, "Morning Sensei, you called for me?"

"Yes Sakura, I have a mission for you. Please wait for your teammates."

The pink haired kunoichi nodded contently and walked over to a couch before sitting down and pulling out a book. One of the very books Tsunade had assigned her to read, it dealt heavily with the mending of bones. Deciding to have a drink before dealing with the village's most hyperactive blond, she loved the boy but his voice gave her a headache. She reached low into a bottom drawer and pulled out a small saucer and a bottle of high price sake, Sakura shook her head as she watched Tsunade take a pleased sniff from the bottle before she started pouring herself a drink.

"Hello Oba-Chan, Sakura" the deep voice parted the silence in the room calmly, but Sakura's head shot up and Tsunade shot back in her chair spilling her sake all over her open top. It had been decades since anyone had managed to get so close to her without her detecting them, but standing in front of her was a tall blond man covered in a large black cloth overcoat, a maroon long sleeved shirt, black pants and a black vest, finished off with a new black cloth added to his headband, replacing the old blue one. Slowly dispersing around his feet was a cloud of smoke, _He used Shunshin and has managed to gain more control over it, which is why there is so little smoke but how did he make it silent?_

"Naruto, next time use the door!"

Sakura in the meanwhile simply starred at the well-built blond, "Naruto?"

She couldn't believe it, no way had four months changed him so much, there was no way that her loud scrawny teammate had changed into a tall handsome man in two months.

Naruto turned his head and looked over at Sakura before letting a small smile face, while before his smiles had been like staring at the sun now they were more like a pleasant scent wafting in as you passed a bakery or flower shop, his smile now wasn't forced and he looked content in life as he hadn't during any of their time on team 7. Before it always seemed like he was smiling in spite of the world around him, now he seemed to understand the world and have found joy in it, to have found a purpose.

Sakura found a smile formed on her own face before she even realized it, everything about Naruto now seemed to inspire confidence and hope, hope for a better tomorrow and that if you persevered that tomorrow would be waiting for you with open arms.

Tsunade however, was having a different reaction, she had seen that smile before and felt its affects, it was the same smile that Minato Namikaze, the Fourth Hokage had that had rallied his forces around him like moths to a flame. She had been the one who he had come to about setting up a diet regiment for healthier food, _But I never expected him to turn into a carbon copy of Minato!_

His face had leaned down and baby fat was gone, his eyes conveyed kindness to his allies but she knew behind those eyes could be a frigid wasteland that would swallow his enemies whole. She couldn't see much since almost all his skin was covered but her years as a medic allowed her to quickly take stock of his muscular condition, he was built for speed but by no means weak as his muscles took on a more springy continence, he seemed highly flexible and his movements wasted little energy.

Then looking at his clothes she knew there would be problems raised at the next council meeting, he was basically wearing a copy of his father's clothes just with a different color scheme. Between that and his now mature face no one with half a brain would be able to refute the truth of Naruto's heritage.

Naruto calmly walked over to Sakura and the two teammates began talking in hushed tones as Tsunade watched from behind her desk. Even just hearing his voice seemed to make the office more comfortable, like there was less of a burden on her shoulders, the room for that second seemed no more daunting than a sake bar she used to hang out at with Jiraiya and Orochimaru when they were genin.

A knock on the door shattered the atmosphere and every bit of the ground shaking responsibility returned, _I hate this job_, shaking her head to clear it of such thoughts she raised her voice, "Enter."

Silver, gravity defying, hair poked in through the door soon followed by the rest of the man, Kakashi walked calmly towards the Hokage's desk, not even bothering to put away the Icha Icha he was reading. As always his eyes were actually panning the room, taking in threats and possible weapons until his eyes landed on Naruto. The color drained from his face and his feet stuttered bringing him to a premature stop where he lurched drunkenly on his feet, "Minato-Sensei?"

Naruto merely turned to the Jounin and scoffed, "No Hatake, I am not my father."

Eyes went wide as the last word was uttered and Tsunade ran through quick hand signs and slammed her palm down on the desk, purple energy surged along the floor, walls and ceiling creating an impenetrable, and most importantly sound proof, barrier. Tsunade turned to glare at Naruto, a glare mixed with anger and worry, "Where did you get that information Naruto, and why would you say it so casually when there could be spies around?!"

Naruto turned back to her and the look in his eyes made her flinch inside, "I figured it out by looking in a fucking mirror Ba-Chan! And I didn't know, I was fishing for confirmation when I said that and I got it. You knew, both of you knew and never told me! What because I was too stupid to know to keep it quiet if you explained it to me?"

Tsunade could see the despair in his eyes; he thought they didn't believe him trustworthy. "Naruto, we just didn't want there to be any chance of anyone finding out, you're father had a lot of enemies."

Naruto's fist tightened but otherwise he reeled back in his anger, he had figured it out a month ago so had time to deal with his emotions, another thing he'd have to thank Danzo for teaching him. _Emotions are useful but you must be careful in using them lest they end up controlling you._

"Its fine Tsunade-sama, I understand your reasons even if I don't agree with them." Naruto's tone was cold and professional, and somehow just not Naruto, without that warmth it was as if he had changed into someone else.

Sakura merely looked lost, she didn't know much about Kakashi's Sensei and he didn't talk about him much. It turns out that Kakashi's Sensei was Naruto's father and a great shinobi if he had so many enemies.

Kakashi was finally getting his feet back under him, "I'm glad you're taking this so well Naruto, it just goes to show how much you've grown up and how strong you've gotten."

This was the wrong thing for him to say as the blond rounded on him, "How would you know how strong I've gotten, Hatake? It's been four months since you've lost your precious Uchiha to dump all your training onto while me and Sakura wasted away hoping to be taught anything. In all that time you never once came to offer your help as my Jounin-Sensei, it was as if as soon as Sasuke was gone you had no interest in our team at all."

With each harsh word the Jounin seemed to sink into himself more and more, it was true that he hadn't gone to help Naruto as he should have, he had been too afraid of Naruto accusing him of not making it in time to help him bring Sasuke back at the valley. Instead he had buried himself in missions which had not given him any time for anything in the village but passing out and having his wounds healed.

Tsunade watched as Naruto ripped into his Sensei but eventually had enough, "Alright Naruto, Enough! I realize you're mad but his rank dictates him as the leader of this mission so you will obey him as your superior officer."

After making sure he understood her meaning she raised her voice and looked at the door, "Sai! Get your pale ass in here!"

The door opened and in stepped a pasty white kid wearing black pants and a black shirt that only covered his chest and one arm. "Hello, I am your new teammate for this mission."

The black haired teen glanced around the room before locking his eyes on Naruto, who was still trying to calm his rage, "You look as if you're going through a woman's period, from now on your name is Dickless."

**Author's Notes:**

**Hey, sorry this one took so long, I've been having internet trouble and finally it will be upgraded to something high speed. As always I'd like you're reviews, I know Sai's intro wasn't very good, my Mojo just wasn't working for that last paragraph plus I really wanted to end this chapter already. **

**I think the training in the beginning was a good idea if I do say so myself, using the clones to gain combat experience is an idea that I strangely have not often seen in other stories and think is a good idea. **

**Obviously Naruto is getting close to Danzo because frankly I like stories where Danzo isn't portrayed as such an ass, just because you're a zealot doesn't mean you have to be a dick. Thanks for reading.**


	5. Chapter 5

Naruto latched onto the familiarity of being insulted and used it to claw his way back to the calm rational part of his mind, despite all the training he had been going through he was still only a 14 year old boy and prone to emotional flux from time to time. By the time he was once again calm the black haired boy, Sai as he claimed, was standing next to Sakura in front of Tsunade. The blond Hokage saw that Naruto had calmed down and mentally thanked the Root agent.

"Okay team 7; your mission is to protect the ambassador of Kumo and his son during their visit to Konoha for the annual neutrality treaty. The ambassador is a close advisor of the Raikage and is pro-alliance with the Leaf. He is almost solely responsible for the good relations we've had with Kumo these last few years, others in the Raikage's council have reportedly not been so kind.

You will pick him up from his guards at the border, escort him here, follow him here as if this were any village and then escort him back to his guards who will meet you three days after you take custody of the ambassador."

Kakashi nodded seriously, "What rank would you assign this mission, Hokage-sama?"

The blond kage waved off his question, "Merely a B rank at the most, a majority of the time will be spent in the village. You will need to leave tomorrow morning to arrive on time for the ambassador so get going early."

The members of team 7 nodded and started to walk out of the office, "Naruto, stay back for a moment would you?"

The whiskered blond stopped and turned, waiting for everyone to leave before closing the door. Once the door was turned Naruto raised an eyebrow and grabbed a small spider off his shoulder and examined it, there were no eyes and it was completely black. He channeled a small amount of chakra through his palm and the spider seemed to disintegrate into black ink on his palm.

Tsunade sighed, "Your new teammate, he seems to be the curious type."

Naruto grabbed a tissue from her desk and wiped the ink off his hand, "Is he what you wanted to talk about?"

Tsunade shook her head and looked at Naruto seriously, "No Naruto, I want to talk about the Ambassador's son. The Nara have identified him as a 'Lynchpin' that could start the Fourth Shinobi War."

Naruto's blue eyes zeroed in on her own, as sharpness previously absent entered, "How" he asked.

"If he were to die, and it were to seem like Leaf-nin were responsible then the ambassador would withdraw his support for Konoha in Kumo's council, the same could be possible if the ambassador himself were to be killed. We need the son and the ambassador to make it back to the border safe or before long Kumo could declare war on us, after that Iwa would see a chance for revenge and join Kumo. This would cause us to call on Suna's debt to us from the failed invasion and the world would be plunged into war. In order to prevent this, if a conflict arises you are to protect the son while your team protects the client."

Naruto nodded, "Do we have any enemies that you suspect will aim to use the 'Lynchpin'?

Tsunade conceded his point and folded her hands before her face, "Only those who could figure out that there is one to use, other than that it should be people with a grudge against the ambassador or bandits."

"Understood, Oba-chan. If I'm dismissed, I think there are some things I need to do before tomorrow."

When Tsunade nodded the blond disappeared with a small gust of wind and the sound of a coat flapping in the wind.

**Training Ground 7**

With the help of the wind Naruto was at the training ground in the blink of an eye, he gasped for air and slowly forced himself to stand straight up, that jutsu was still tiring to use for such long distances. Once his breathing calmed he summoned around 200 clones, "alright all of you, 3 minute walk in any direction then come back here. I want to get Bureido (Blade Storm) down tonight, keep practicing until you get it down or dispel."

Naruto walked to the middle of the clearing as his clones ran off, once there he channeled chakra into the weights on his arms and legs unlocking the weights concealed there. With small booms they hit the ground, then bringing his arms up he crossed his fingers and pushed some chakra into his coat, down through the threads until he reached the weight seals put on it. The coat glowed blue for a moment before returning to normal. Then running through a short series of hand signs Naruto unlocked the resistance seals he had placed on his chest. _I really need to find a way to do this faster; I'll be killed before I can get my weights off_. _O well, nothing to do for it now, I'll just not wear my weights when we're outside the village._

Moving carefully Naruto began to walk around the clearing, then to jog and finally to run with seemingly exaggerated carefulness. Finally he stopped and sighed, the first time he had taken his weights off he wasn't prepared for the difference in speed and knocked himself out against a tree, then grinning fiercely he seemed to vanish and dents started appearing on trees all over the clearing. Naruto's blond hair looked like a firefly zipping about in the failing light of the day.

After about an hour Naruto appeared in the center of the clearing breathing slightly harder than normal and looked over his shoulder, at a seemingly normal tree, and into the stunned blacked eyes of Sai who thought he had hidden from the blond. The black haired teen quickly melted into a pool of oil as Sai retreated, _Danzo-sama will need to know this, the Jinchuurikin is much more powerful than the reports say._

By the next morning the trees surrounding looked as if a battalion of samurai had fought its way past them. The last of the clones had dispelled hours earlier and Naruto slept comfortably in a tree.

After getting up and stretching the blond headed into town, quickly arriving at the weapon shop he found Tenten in. He had started regularly coming to them for his weapons and equipment, finding Tenten's father to be one of the few who didn't hold his burden against him, much of his money went to buying equipment to replace his previously subpar gear. With the customary chime the blond walked through the door and up to the counter, on his way there he had to dodge a blunted kunai that shot at his leg, he placed his arms on the counter and leaned forward as Tenten came out of the back room.

"You're getting better, that would've hit you last month, I'm glad you stopped using your sword to block things like that."

"Yeah, yeah, you'll kill me if I break the sword before becoming famous, I know." The blond drawled out with a smirk. This had become a sort of routine for them when he came to buy things, if Tenten was working she would throw blunted kunai at him until he learned to dodge them, the first time he had used his sword to block instead of dodge she had smacked the poor blond and dragged him out to a training field to show him how to use his sword properly. Since then she had become something of an occasional Kenjutsu trainer/ sparring partner.

"I need some more kunai and some shuriken, maybe a few senbon if you have them."

Tenten glared at him exasperatedly, "You're not still trying to channel water around your weapons are you? There's a reason people don't do that Naruto! All it's doing is wearing down your weapons and making them rust."

The blond stood back up, "I'm getting closer, it almost worked last week! Just you wait and see I can get it to work."

Tenten merely sighed, she had been trying to tell him why it couldn't work ever since he had proposed the idea to her, but the blond idiot had just continued to say he was making progress.

"Whatever, idiot." She stuck her tongue out at the blond as he passed her his money, before walking back to the aisle and grabbing what he needed.

"Bye Tenten, see you when we get back." Naruto called as he waved on his way out the door.

"Don't die too pathetically; we need to get famous off you!" Tenten called back mischievously.

Once out the door Naruto vanished in a stream of wind, he arrived at the front gate an instant later, he was able to hide his labored breathing from his teammates. _I'm getting better_. A few seconds later he was breathing normally and standing beside Sakura and their new teammate Sai. Sai didn't seem to have any pack at all but there was a small bag of seals on his hip, Sakura was only armed with a single pouch of kunai and shuriken.

Checking the sun Naruto figured they were 10 minutes early, _Hatake should arrive about an hour after that and we'll have to really race to make it there on time_.

Shockingly after 5 minutes Kakashi appeared in a puff of smoke, holding his trademark orange book. Noticing the surprise on Naruto's face Kakashi smiled inside _This is the least I can do_

"Alright Team, let's get going!" With an eye smile the silver haired Jounin started walking past the Chunin guards at the gate, quickly followed by the rest of Team 7 both old and new.

**Author's notes:**

**Not one of my better chapters in my opinion, please review and I'll try to find my muse a bit more before the next chapter. It may not be the best but it moves the story along a bit and I felt I should stay on schedual for you guys and get a chapter put up, thanks for reading.**


	6. Chapter 6

**Quick Author note: Hey guys this story has reached 54 reviews, 180 followers, 120 favorites and is part of 7 different communities. Considering this is my second fanfiction ever I am very proud of this and wish to thank you all for reading, I hope I'll be able to keep going for a long time and keep you guys entertained, please enjoy.**

The first thing Sakura noticed when they set out was that traveling with Naruto wasn't the same as before. He was still willing to talk and was always looking around but even how he did that was different. Before it was like he was looking at every tree and bush for the first time and such simple things would excite and please him, but now the way his eyes were moving was more reminiscent of some of the older shinobi she had treated at the hospital, always looking for enemies to launch an attack from hiding.

Sakura had no idea that, in fact, the purpose behind Naruto's wondering eyes hadn't changed at all. He merely didn't hide it anymore, he had always been checking for a sneak attack, not because Iruka had told him to always be on his guard on missions, but because he was always on guard even in the village. Too many times had relaxation cost him a cuff to the back of the head from a disgruntled villager and he had realized that all too easily those hands could've held a dagger and his life would be over.

Sai had been watching Naruto as well, he approved of the way the blond was aware for enemies, and he had grown a certain wariness of the blond Jinchuurikin after watching him train. _Fortunately, Danzo-sama's orders don't involve any offensive action against the Jinchuurikin unless he tries to defect or is captured_.

In accordance with his orders he had tried to befriend the blond, he had read more than a few books on friendship but seemingly he didn't have it down yet. _The book said nicknames that were slightly offensive to the person to whom they prefer was a good thing, but whenever I refer to Naruto-san as Dickless he gets a strange look on his face. It isn't anger or aggression but it does share some commonalities with the two, I'll have to research this later._

Kakashi wasn't even pretending to read his book, for once, he was acting like the legendary shinobi that he was. The dressing down Naruto had given him kept replaying in his mind, over and over; he had let Naruto down, both before and after Sasuke left. _I won't let you down again Naruto._

The trip was spent in relative silence as Naruto and Sakura traded the occasional comment while Sai silently observed and Kakashi threw in a word here and there. Several hours in Sakura was starting to pant heavily, while her stamina had increased greatly over the past few months under Tsunade she still had a long way to go, Kakashi saw and signaled that they would walk for a while. _We're close enough to the border anyway; might as well give everyone a chance to recover_.

Naruto made the transition silently, walking without a single change in his breathing, he took a deep breath in threw his nose. He had always enjoyed a better than average sense of smell, probably inherited from the Kyuubi, and enjoyed the smell of trees. He smiled softly; he could smell the grass, the leaves, the bark, the animals in the timber, and something bitter. The blond focused harder on that scent, leaving the others behind as he tried to identify the tangy bitter smell; with a start he remembered the smell. He had gone to Shizune to get help with learning about poisons, after seeing her blow out a poisonous gas when fighting Kabuto she seemed like the best option, she was helping him learn to make his own but it was slow work.

_The smell is coming from the forest, that means they're enemies or we just happen to be passing other shinobi._ He mentally scoffed at the second option and lightly flared his chakra, Kakashi turned back to Naruto with an eye smile, "Do you think that the ambassador will be an annoyance, Naruto?"

The blond merely raised an eyebrow, _So he wants to know if there's an annoyance nearby, I'd say enemy shinobi count._ "I'd say so Kakashi-Sensei, they're all the same and you never seem to know how many of them there are. In my opinion they're more a poison then a balm."

The silver haired Jounin shrugged and turned back to the read, _So he was able to smell the poison, good job Naruto._ "I know what you mean Naruto; give me a squad of shinobi any day over a politician."

Sai had also started paying closer attention, if he was reading the conversation right, there were four poison using shinobi waiting out there to ambush them. _I need to ask Danzo-sama for more training, I only detected three of them._

Sakura meanwhile was subtly pulling senbon out of a thick bracelet on her wrist, _I won't be useless again, Watch me Naruto, Kakashi-Sensei!_

Apparently the signal had been given as kunai seemed to erupt from the trees, falling upon the team like a fresh summer rain, however the team was more than ready. Naruto ran through a quick series of hand signs before throwing his hands up in the air "Wind Style: Uindou~ōru (Wind Wall)"

From his hands a wall of wind exuded, quickly buffeting the thrown weapons down into the dirt at his feet. With the customary snapping sound of his coat, the blond was gone. Sai kneeled on the road and within three seconds 2 large ink lions left off the page and charged into the woods, with Sai disappearing in an Ink Shunshin.

A puff of smoke behind Kakashi signaled the arrival of two shinobi, both dressed in a mix of dark green and grey. The older of the two wielded a pair of trench knives similar to Asuma and wore the standard Jounin vest, the younger was a small boy wielding a tanto with dark brown spiky hair. The boy tried to slash at Kakashi's leg but was still unstable from the Shunshin, _probably still not used to the disorientation_ Kakashi mused before lifting his leg and stomping on the tanto, sending it to the ground. He followed up with a side kick that sent the boy skidding along the road past Sakura and into the forest on the opposite side of the road they had come from.

Sakura nodded to her Sensei and took a soldier pill before jumping into the forest after her opponent.

With the genin gone it was now only Kakashi and the other Jounin. The man was around 5'11 with a barrel chest and an X shaped scar on his cheek. His brown hair was starting to grey and fell messily around his head. His forehead protector was old and had dents and cuts from numerous battles surrounding the symbol for the Rain Village.

Kakashi sighed, still standing in a relaxed posture after having kicked away the genin, "So I take it you're supposed to kill us and take our place, once you take custody of the ambassador you'd kill him and his son?" It was said more as a statement than a question; both older men knew the truth of the shinobi world.

The other man merely entered his stance, ready to fight Konoha's famed Copy ninja. Kakashi shook his head sadly; _the fool doesn't even know who he sent his genin to fight_. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry."

The elderly shinobi was so shocked by the sincerity in Kakashi's voice that he allowed himself to prolong the fight, "Sorry for what?"

The silver haired Jounin looked right into his eye as he pulled up the headband covering the legendary Sharingan, "I'm sorry for the loss of your genin."

As if to punctuate his statement, a short high pitched scream of pain and fear sounded from deep within the trees before being suddenly cut off.

"Ishin!"

The Jounin clearly wanted to run towards the source of the scream and help his student but experience told him there was nothing he could do for him now. With a furious scream he ran through seals and thrust his palm towards his Konoha counterpart, "U~ōtāsupia (Water Spear)".

Water flowed out of the canteens on his back and shot at the silver haired Jounin who leapt to the side to dodge as the water roared past him. Pulling a kunai Kakashi rushed forward at the Ame-nin. With an added hand seal the water, now behind the charging Kakashi, turned and rushed at Kakashi's exposed back.

A spear made of water exploded from the Sharingan wielding shinobi just as he was about to bring his kunai down on the elderly ninja, "Such a disappointment, that one of your status should be taken out by such a simple trick."

Kakashi's eyes widened as the water spear was yanked out of his lung and he fell to the ground glaring up at the other Jounin. The elderly Jounin moved forward with his trench knives to finish the job and stopped in front of the downed Kakashi, "I'll make it quick"

Just as he moved down to make the cut the Kakashi in front of him seemed to waver and then fall apart, as if a mirage, then a blinding pain and a loud screeching blinded his senses. Turning his head slightly he saw Kakashi standing behind him with his lightning covered hand plunged through his back. As the Jounin began to fall Kakashi pulled out his hand and caught his dying enemy, gently lowering him to the ground and slowly closed his eyes. "Your team will be along shortly, guide them through the afterlife as you have through this one."

After offering a small prayer for the downed shinobi Kakashi stood up, "Should probably go make sure everyone is alright."

With a surge of speed the road was clear, except the body of the Jounin sensei of the Ame-team.

**With Sakura**

The boy had recovered quickly and pulled out another small tanto by the time Sakura reached the clearing, "Give up girl, your Sensei and teammates are already dead. Let me send you to them."

Sakura thought about what the brown haired boy in front of her was saying, growing more and more angry at again being underestimated, of being reminded of how useless she was before, "Fuck You!"

The pink haired Kunoichi charged forward with kunai and senbon in hand.

**With Sai**

Sai watched from the trees as a blond genin wielding nothing but kunai and shuriken tried to fight off his ink lions. For a moment Sai felt pity for the genin, _There must've been a clerical error somewhere down the line, this team was not prepared for shinobi level combat._ The second the pity appeared it was squashed down by Sai's mental shields. With deft hands Sai pulled out his brush and quickly sketched a squid before bringing it to life. It surged off the paper and used its tentacles to swing from branch to branch like a sloth until it hit the ground.

The genin had actually managed to dispel one lion but had a deep slash to the thigh. While he was focusing on the remaining Ink lion a completely black tentacle came out of a bush and wrapped around his ankle, it was followed by more and more until he toppled, bound completely by Sai's Ink creation. The boy screamed fearfully as Sai brought down his tanto, the cut was clean and the boy's head rolled clear as Sai dispelled his drawings.

**With Naruto**

Naruto stood calmly in the middle of a small clearing, he could hear the clones the other genin had made running through the trees hoping to confuse him, the wind blew softly around him nipping at his coat. He closed his eyes and raised his voice to the forest around him, "Your teammates are already dead, if you leave now I won't pursue you. Please just leave, I don't want to do this."

A high pitched voice rang out from multiple directions, "My team will never die, and even if they did what are you going to do? Kill all of me?"

The voice was mocking and full of fear, and broke Naruto's heart. He opened his eyes and let a single tear roll down his cheek. He turned on his heel and started walking back towards the road, calling back with a voice full of remorse, "I killed all of you 10 seconds ago."

Splashes of water were heard all over the clearing as shadow clones using Kamereon hifu (chameleon skin justu) let their camouflage fall as they stabbed the boy and all his clones in the heart.

**Author's Notes**

**Alex 2909: He was use primarily wind and Water jutsu as his affinity but won't be liminted.**

**Kirallie: He still talks and plays strategy games with Danzo but Danzo isn't the type to accept just as much information as he can get through a conversation like that, Danzo is thorough and obviously wants more ways to influence Naruto as the Jinchuuriken.**

**Braygen: I'm not sure yet in all honesty, I haven't even thought about the summons much yet. I'll get back to you later on that one.**


	7. Chapter 7

**I want to start off by apologizing for taking so long, I had most of this chapter written before my computer freaked out and deleted it, as you can well imagine this slowed me down more than just a tad, I should've saved more prodigiously and for that mistake I apologize.**

**With Sakura**

A tanto flashed through the air but missed the pinkette's jugular; leaning forward had saved her life. With a quick jab a senbon was stuck deep into the boy's arm, causing him to scream out in pain. With a chakra propelled leap the boy sailed through the air away from the young medic-nin, just barely escaping a slash from her kunai that would've spilled his intestines.

Sakura stood back up and took a deep breath before steadying, the soldier pill had done wonders to restore her stamina and the adrenaline rush made it stretch, the boy on the other hand was breathing hard covered in sweat as he pulled out the senbon. After experimentally moving his fingers and arm he laughed boisterously at the medic, "Is this all you have?"

Sakura meanwhile ignored his taunt, doing complex calculations in her head as she figured in body mass, physical exertion and potency of the poison she had put on the senbon. _Three, Two, One_. She flinched as the boy suddenly dropped to his knees, his tanto hitting the ground with a solid thud, a scream tore its way out of his throat as he clawed desperately at his windpipe, fear and pain etched deeply into his face.

Sakura watched on, subjectively she knew that she had to wait for the enemy nin to fall unconscious, but everything Tsunade had taught her screamed at her to give him the antidote now and end his pain. Finally, the screaming stopped and the young tanto-wielder toppled to the ground. She waited a few seconds, to see if he was faking, then rushed forward and turned him over. She poured the antidote into his mouth and gently worked his Adam's apple with her fingers to make him swallow before using medical chakra to heal his throat; his fingernails had begun to tear through the skin before he had lost consciousness.

With barely a whisper her teammates arrived on the scene, a quick glance sent relief through her body, _They're all okay._

Kakashi gave his famous eye-smile, "Well done Sakura, now we can interrogate the enemy and find out who hired them." Turning serious he looked at the rest of his team, "You guys will not want to be here for this, go wait on the road."

The three teens nodded and quietly returned to the road, a few minutes later Kakashi appeared in a Shunshin after having disposed of all the bodies, "I'll explain on the road, can't be late to this one." Nodding the team started walking once again towards the border.

"Some minor politician from Ame was offended by the ambassador two months ago. Said politician heard about the ambassador's trip to Konoha and hired the team to come ambush us and kill the ambassador. The mission briefing said that we would be a low level genin team with few missions above D rank."

Naruto cocked his head to the side, "Technically we haven't had many missions above D rank, so their intel wasn't quite THAT bad."

Sai decided to pipe in, "Their estimation of our strengths based upon the mission documents were incorrect, but the fact that they were able to even get such low level intelligence means that we will have to report a leak in the Hokage Tower upon our return."

Kakashi nodded, conceding the point, "We'll tell it all in our debriefing Sai."

Two hours later they arrived at the border, "Naruto, Sai take up positions in the trees. Stay out of sight."

The boys nodded and disappeared into the trees while their teammate and leader waited for the Kumo-nin to arrive. An hour later Sakura turned to her silver haired teacher and spoke softly, "They're late, Kakashi-Sensei."

Kakashi didn't even look up from his book as he replied back, "They're traveling with a civilian Sakura, they might have had to stop multiple times for their client."

Eventually the client and his son arrived and the handoff occurred with all the general distrust that shinobi of different villages are known for. The trip was quiet, with only as much small talk as was politely necessary, they did have to stop multiple times for the client who while not in bad health, wasn't up to shinobi standards.

It took the rest of the day to make it back to the village, by the time they reached the village gate the sky had begun to grow dark and stars were starting to poke through. They escorted the ambassador and his son to the hotel specifically set up for foreign emissaries, it was guarded by several members of Anbu at all times, once the client was in his room Kakashi turned to his team. "Okay guys, good job out there today. Go ahead and go home, we'll debrief in the morning."

The skin around Sai's eyes grew slightly tight, "We have arrived back in the village, we should go to Hokage-sama and report and debrief."

Kakashi seemed to nod to himself as if he expected this, "I understand that is protocol Sai but trust me in that one night won't matter, and you do not want to be waking Tsunade-sama at this time of night. Can't debrief if we're dead."

"But the report must be given promptly when we return."

"Sai, I don't know about you but I'm tired and a tired shinobi may remember events wrong. Is it better to turn in a report fast or accurate?"

The pale boy seemed to ponder this for several seconds before slowly nodding, "I understand, Kakashi-Sempai."

The rest of the week passed quickly, they would show up at the Hotel every morning and escort the ambassador and his client to the Hokage tower. Once there he would be under protection of the Anbu and the team would be allowed time off. During these breaks Kakashi insisted that they go to the training fields to work on their teamwork.

For once, the silver haired Jounin seemed to be vested in their training and was throwing every trick in the book at them, to make them work as a team and adapt at a moment's notice with perfect knowledge of their teammate's actions.

After 3 days of teamwork training he came to them after lunch handing them each a slip of paper, "Okay you three, this is Chakra paper and it will tell me your chakra affinity. Your chakra affinity will tell you which style of elemental Ninjutsu you will be able to learn easiest. This doesn't mean you can't learn other elements but it'll be easiest with your element. Now channel chakra into your paper and we'll see your elements."

The three nodded holding their paper and channeled their chakra, causing the paper to glow blow for a moment, the reaction happened within seconds. Sakura's paper grew brittle and was blown apart by a slight breeze. Sai's paper crinkled until it was drawn tight against his pinched thumb and forefinger. Naruto's paper was split, but not just once the paper was cut into about 25 pieces that then proceeded to slowly fall to the ground. If not for Kakashi's trained eyes he would've missed them growing wet and falling at a much higher velocity. Squatting down on his haunches the Jounin tried to pick up one of the pieces but the moment he tried to lift it the place his fingers held tore loose with little resistance.

Dusting his hands Kakashi smiled happily at his three students, "Well this is unusual, you all have different chakra affinities, Sai you have a high affinity for lightning Jutsu, Sakura you have an Earth affinity and Naruto you have a very strong affinity for both wind and water jutsu."

Sakura sighed unhappily, "But doesn't that mean you can't train all of us? There's no way you have four affinities even if Naruto had two."

Kakashi merely eye smiled at the pinkette, "It's true that I don't have an affinity in them all but I do have jutsu from them all and know the training to Master each, I am the shinobi with over 1,000 jutsu after all."

Making a cross symbol Kakashi made three shadow clones and then focused back on his students, "Okay, one of these shadow clones will go with each of you and start you on learning to control your element better. This will help you in making the jutsu of your element cost less chakra and be stronger, and will make you understand it better and able to make Jutsu of your own someday like my Chidori." Deciding that a little showing off was in order he flashed through the hand signs and his fist roared to life, covered in a dancing ball of electricity too bright to look at.

He powered down his Chidori and nodded to his clones, the clones nodded back and waked up to each teen. They put a hand on each one's shoulder and disappeared in Shunshin, taking their students with them for more private training.

The silver hair Jounin, now standing alone in the training field, lifted his headband and created 12 more clones all standing with Sharingan bared. The next second the training ground was a warzone. Fire, Water, Lightning, Wind and Earth were flung about with almost casual ease while retaining surgical precision. Trees shattered, waves crashed and the earth surged. _I won't fail my team again!_

With a flare of chakra the weight seals deactivated and the silver haired Jounin moved with speed that would've made a certain spandex wearing man cry tears of joy. The clones threw jutsu of every element at the original but he was little more than a blur now as he whizzed between his clones, who could only go as fast as the original could with his weights still active. The battle waged on for hours when Kakashi formed twin chidori's and focused his chakra through his hands causing the Chidori's to extend to the length of a tanto. Plunging them through the clones' chests causing them to dispel ending the fight.

"Should go get them, we have to go pick up the ambassador."


	8. Chapter 8

**Sorry for taking so long, I went to Anime Iowa this weekend and obviously was a little busy to be writing sadly. Went as Zabuza with my very own homemade zambato. Was pretty fun.**

The team had set off at sunrise the day and was well on the way to the rendezvous point with their client in tow. All in all it had been a rather boring mission, at least for Team 7, the ambassador seemed perfectly content with his visit and his son was just doing what little kids usually do, being bored. If nothing else, the week was productive in that it helped to rebuild the bridges that both Naruto and Kakashi had feared burned, it helped make Kakashi Naruto's sensei again. Naruto was still pissed that his silver haired teacher had failed to teach him before but he was making up for it now, better late than never.

Sai, well it's not that he opened up, but he did manage to act less like a robotic dick all the time. He had taken to calling Naruto and Sakura by their names, partially out of self-preservation after Sakura had punched him through a tree.

During his morningly shogi games with Danzo he had mentioned that he was starting elemental training and that he possessed a wind and a water affinity. The old man had always seemed to be interested in Naruto's training and they talked about it often.

_Flash Back****_

"_Kakashi-Sensei says that the results of the test conclude that I have a strong Wind and Water affinity."_

_The old man merely hmmed thoughtfully, "Both are powerful elements, people seem to think that Fire and lightning are the most powerful elements because they're the flashiest. Fools who think being a shinobi is about the most obvious and powerful jutsu. The truth is that a senbon to the brain is more effective than a Chidori through the chest! Remember this, boy. A shinobi isn't the person with the most powerful jutsu, a true shinobi is the one who does what's needed to walk away once the battle is over."_

_Naruto had just nodded, these types of rants/lessons were common place in his morningly games. Danzo would propose a lesson then tell the answer, and slowly add logic until the blond found himself agreeing. The old man was cynical, there was no doubt about that, paranoid too, but that didn't mean he wasn't right. Through Danzo's lessons he had begun to realize that most of the shinobi he graduated with were still looking at the world through rose colored glasses. _

_Danzo's words had been passing through the blonde's head fast forward and repeat as he had killed that young Nin earlier that week. "Sometimes you can't capture an enemy and if you leave him alive how will you be able to live with yourself if he later kills a shinobi of the Leaf."_

_The words were simple but struck a chord within the blond, how could he place his desire to be merciful above the possibility of a comrade's death._

"_I'm glad Hatake is taking his job as a teacher more serious this time around." Danzo scoffed with begrudging respect, he respected the man's abilities but they had never seen eye to eye. _

"_He's doing well, I'm learning a lot more than before" Naruto replied with a soft smile before it spoiled into a frown and muttered, "not that he could do much worse."_

"_He is a skilled shinobi and knows a great many jutsu but he knows them through the power of his borrowed Sharingan, the Sharingan gives a user instinctive knowledge on how to use a jutsu that they see. Just knowing the answer doesn't mean you can teach the jutsu to another, after all he never learned it that way himself. While I may not know as many jutsu as Hatake I do have an extensive library of Water jutsu and personal knowledge of Wind Jutsu. The Hokage would not appreciate my keeping this knowledge to myself and has been hounding me to turn over any jutsu I appropriated during the wars for years, so you must understand that if you accept my training it must be kept secret from everyone."_

_Naruto's frown deepened but his eyes were sharp, he didn't like the idea of keeping things from his team or Tsunade but he understood that Shinobi often became hoarders during times of war and didn't always turn over their war spoils to the village. He had learned that from Danzo and understood it well, being a lifetime hoarder himself. Having almost all the venders in the village refusing to service him had taught the blond to never give up something that he couldn't get back._

"_Give me time to think about it, Danzo-Oji." _

_With that said the conversations ended, Danzo knew eventually the boy would meet a challenge his training couldn't prepare him for, and at that point the blond Jinchuuriki would come to him for training. He just had to hope the boy would survive that trial, of course, that was why he had assigned Sai to Naruto's team._

_Almost anyone who knew the old Root leader would be shocked if they knew it, but Danzo actually liked Naruto. That wasn't to say he didn't see the blond as a tool and a weapon but the blond reminded him of how he was at that age. Young, Determined, Intelligent, Eager and Loyal. The paranoia wasn't there yet but Danzo was trying to drill that into him without the loss of teammates to help create it. Paranoia was a useful skill, one that he insisted be taught to all of his Root agents but Naruto was a special case. He couldn't have instructors constantly throwing kunai while he was taking a shower or eating breakfast, not right now anyway. So he taught the slow way, the same way the First Hokage and Second Hokage taught him and Sarutobi, with cynicism and stories of how things went wrong._

The road was easy, well-traveled and even a civilian could eat up distance quickly. Fortunately, this time the ambassador and his kid were fresh and had not spent the day walking like they had when Team 7 had taken custody of the two. By noon they were at the rendezvous point and exchanged brief greetings with the Kumo-team and a grateful goodbye to the ambassador and his son.

They turned and started on their way back to the village, there were dark clouds a few miles away and the occasional distant rumble of thunder. 20 minutes later a much closer roar brushed past their ears causing them to turn, looking down the long road that lead to Kumo. They could see smoke rising lazily, disappearing into dark clouds. They spared a glance at each other and nodded, even if the ambassador was no longer technically under their protection they knew Konoha would still get the blame if they were able to detect the battle and not help. That and Naruto had divulged to them earlier that week the 'Lynch pin' theory, and that any harm to the ambassador or his child could have disastrous consequences for Konoha and the rest of the shinobi world.

They covered the ground quickly, Naruto and Sai splitting off to come in from the flanks as the blond made clones to take their places with quick use of the Henge. Kakashi and Sakura made it to the battle field first. One Kumo nin was left, he was bleeding heavily from a gash on his right bicep but he held strong to an earth wall that was keeping the ambassador and his son from being bisected by a thin high pressure jet of water.

The other three shinobi on his team were strewn around the road; one was laying on the side of the road exactly one foot shorter, his head laying down in the ditch. A second was pinned to a tree by a tanto but had also managed to place a kunai in his killer's temple before he went. The other nin was wearing the head band of the Waterfall village. The last member of the team had apparently gone down hard, the earth around him was scorched by multiple lightning strikes unfortunately he was also surrounded by a pool of water tainted with dark swirls of blood. Both his and the waterfall Nin lying at the edge of the pool. Most likely the water had been put in place before the lightning user had tried to shock the Waterfall Nin and had killed them both.

Kakashi and Sakura took all this in within a second and sprang into action; Kakashi sprinted forward as he flashed through hand signs before pointing at the water attack. "Raition, raito yari! (Lightning Release; Light Spear)." A thin bolt of lightning lit up the ground as it surged around the water at contact. Quickly flowing up stream it raced back to the enemy Nin and into the tree line. The water suddenly stopped allowing the lightning to arc harmlessly into the ground.

Sakura meanwhile ran to the Kumo nin holding the earth wall in place and launched a devastating front punch at the earth wall causing it to not only break but to shoot into the forest, 100 pieces of rock flying at the speed of a kunai. Trees were punctured and torn to shreds as this hail of dirt and rock flew through them. The enemy barely escaped the range of the defensive wall turned projectile; his path to escape brought him to the road.

He wore a green flak jacket and clean blue slacks, reminiscent of the Konoha Jounin uniform, covering his face was white combat bandage, it reached up to his eyes but allowed his short dark brown hair to spike up slightly and wave in the slight breeze. Charcoal brown eyes seemed to sparkle as he eyed Kakashi and Sakura, through his bandaged made mask a hungry smirk could just barely be made out. "Kakashi of the Sharingan, this must be my lucky day. The girl isn't bad either, in more ways than one."

Sakura remained impassive at the comment, one of the first things Tsunade had done was to beat that overly emotional hair trigger out of her. She was busy figuring out what poison of her arsenal to use on this man, the fact that he dodged both her and Kakashi's attacks proved he wasn't a lightweight.

Kakashi reached up and pushed his headband to a level position, revealing his Sharingan tomes spinning angrily around his pupil, the unnamed Nin focused his gaze on Kakashi's torso.

"So you know how to counter the Sharingan?" It wasn't a question but a statement.

The man chuckled, "I've been wanting to meet you for a long time."

He reached back and pulled at a pommel sticking up over his shoulder, slowly revealing a large cleaver shaped blade. "Now," for a moment he seemed to shutter in some type of ecstasy before stilling and looking at the two Konoha Nin and the survivor of the Kumo team, "let's play." _Before she gets here and ruins all my fun! _He added in his head.

During the ensuing stand off the soft pitter of falling rain started to grace their ears before the downpour reached them drenching them all. The sword wielding Nin let his head fall back and barked out his laughter, "This just really isn't your day, Hatake!"

"Suiton: Reijingu hebi! (Water Style: Raging Serpent). In a split second the hand signs were done and the falling rain provided all the water that was needed to form a behemoth of a snake, made entirely of water with glowing yellow eyes. With no hesitation it launched forward, Kakashi and Sakura jumped to the side while the Kumo Nin flashed through hand signs of his own, standing directly between the charging snake and the terrified ambassador.

"Doton: Pāto umi! (Earth Style: Part the Sea) his voice was like gravel, low and rough but as he slammed his hands down on the earth two slabs of solid bedrock rose, forming together at an angle like the tip of a blade. The falling rain didn't help him but he still managed to hold the Jutsu together, when the snake plowed into it its head split to either side of the rock barricade and flew to the left or right of the ambassador.

Kakashi flew through the same hand signs that the waterfall Nin had but a moment earlier and produced his own, albeit smaller, water snake and commanded it to charge at his enemy. Sakura meanwhile sprinted at the enemy while throwing a veritable barrage of poison kunai, senbon, shuriken and poison ladled smoke bombs, once close enough she leapt into the air focusing chakra into her first, just as Tsunade had taught her.

The waterfall Nin swept his gigantic sword batting away the kunai, senbon and shuriken before bisecting the great snake. The rain did a good job of keeping the poison from the smoke bombs of ever drifting up to his mouth or nostrils. At the last second before he was going to give the flying girl the same treatment he had the snake he sensed her, begrudgingly he took a step back and his place was filled by an green haired girl dressed in fishnets with a large gourd on her back. She looked up at Sakura and cocked back her own fist before meeting the pink haired medic fist to fist.

Sakura was at first shocked when the new girl had gone to meet her punch and then steadied herself and surged even more chakra to her fore arm, wrist and forearm. It was this that kept her arm still attached, when the two girls' punches connected Sakura cried out in pain as the bones in her hand and wrist were shattered to pieces and her momentum reversed sending her flying back into the waiting arms of the earth.

Kakashi stared and quickly took in the new information, _Who is this girl? Sakura had enough chakra in that punch to shatter trees!_

The green haired girl looked over at Kakashi, no check that she was looking past Kakashi at the ambassador, the girl was paying the silver haired Jounin no mind what so ever.

In a soft but deadly serious voice the girl spoke seemingly to herself and to them, "Fu, needs you to die now."

**Author's Notes:**

**Once again sorry for taking so long, I'll try to get back to a more regular schedule now that Anime Iowa is over. Tell me what you think, and what do you think should happen to Fu? I'll accept recommendations, no promise I'll listen to them but the only way you can increase the odds of getting it your way is if you tell me! Lol Hope you enjoyed, comment please, see you in a few days.**

**Fixed the jutsu names by apparently overwhelming comments lol so now It's fixed.**


	9. Chapter 9

Any other words the green haired girl had intended to say were interrupted as a tsunami wall of wind and water surged from the trees blowing her away as her teammate stabbed his cleaver into the ground using it both as shield and grappling hook against the winds. The girl wasn't so lucky as she was sent flying through several trees before coming to rest against a particularly sturdy Oak in another clearing. Before a second had passed black snakes surged out from behind the tree wrapping around the momentarily stunned girl and began constructing with all their considerable might.

The lack of oxygen actually forced the girl back into focus as she used brute strength to start ripping her hands free of the snakes, though she had managed this Sai's ink creations weren't so easily beaten. The snakes fell apart before forming back together around her chest and constricting even harder. With every snake she would grab and rip to pieces it would just reform within moments when she focused on another. With a frustrated and angry cry orange chakra started surging from her body.

It was slow at first but as the chakra gained more detail the snakes seemed to disintegrate as if doused in acid. By the time a tail reminiscent of a stinger made of chakra sprouted from her lower back the snakes were burnt and dispersed. She stood up slightly crouched over with her eyes sweeping the trees. In some of the very trees she had just passed over where Naruto crouched, wide eyed and unable to move as his mind traveled back to the Valley of the End, _that's just like the Kyuubi's chakra cloak!_

She was looking far to his right when suddenly her head whipped back staring straight at him through his cover, _What The Fuck!_ Was all Naruto had time to think before she appeared in his tree and swung at him with a chakra covered fist. The blonde's speed training hadn't been for nothing though as he leaned back easily dodging the girl's fist.

While leaned back he swept his left arm forward and released a kunai, which he kept hidden up his sleeve, when she was in his arc. The small blade flew directly at the extended girl's temple and was able to end her life when a small carapace covered hand made out of chakra grew out of her shoulder and swatted the kunai away. "That's just not fair" he muttered annoyed.

The blond back flipped away and into the clearing just as the waterfall Nin brought her fist down on the tree where he'd been standing, blowing it to pieces. Naruto calmly reached back and brought out his sword, the sun reflecting off its well-maintained black blade. Holding up his other hand with two fingers extended towards the sky he whispered, "Kage Bunshin No Jutsu."

With near silent popping sounds and small clouds of smoke 7 replicas of the blond, sword and all, were standing around the original. He was honestly dying to ask her about being a Jinchuuriki but the way she shattered that tree suggested she wasn't in a talkative mood. With a nod the clones disappeared from sight. The girl seemed to start dancing in place as she bent forward then backwards, then jumped before doing a cartwheel all the while puffs of smoke would occasionally burst around her from seemingly nowhere.

The clones had been moving at speeds too high for most chunin or even some Jounin to see, but this girl had managed to take them all out. When she stopped moving Naruto allowed himself a small grin, it hadn't been a bloodless affair for the chakra cloaked shinobi, on her arms and legs were small cuts that slowly dripped blood down her fishnets.

Not wasting anytime he did what he'd been wanting to for a while, "You're a Jinchuuriki aren't you?"

The girl didn't show any emotion as her voice drifted over the clearing, "Fu is holder of a monster."

_She's obviously the Jinchuuriki, either she's trying to lie or she refers to herself in the third person. That's kind of crazy._ An image of Gaara with his sand swirling around him as he laughed crazily while demanding blood flashed through his mind. _Never mind, she is completely understandable._

Fu took advantage of his musings and focused on bringing out a second tail, once it had formed behind her back she disappeared with speed rivaling his own. His lapse in concentration almost cost him as he barely managed to bring up his sword to block the punch traveling towards his head. Her punch was stopped but she was steadily pushing forward slowly bending his blade back towards him, if it weren't for the light weight abilities of his sword he was sure it would've shattered by now. _Crap how do I get out of this! If I fall back the punch will land but she's too damn strong to overpower and I need at least one hand for all my Ninjutsu_. _ Damn it I can't even see with this rain dragging my hair down into my eyes! Wait!_

Naruto slowly directed his chakra down towards his feet and felt it swirl through the puddles they were standing in, he pushed his chakra through one puddle to another until his chakra saturated much of the water in the clearing, his blade was inching closer to his face as he struggled to stave off Fu's fist.

He pushed his chakra out again faster and made it heavy with his water nature and could feel the chakra laced water in the clearing react to him, he had read it was easier to perform jutsu on water that was already filled with chakra, there was no way he could perform a jutsu through his foot but he remembered that day when he had manipulated the water without hand signs. The water sluggishly began to gather behind the waterfall Nin and begrudgingly rose into the air before dragging itself towards her back. The speed it was moving at would be laughed at by any respectable shinobi but he only needed it as a distraction, the water crashed into Fu's back startling her. She shoved off Naruto's sword knocking him off his feet while throwing a backhand at the presumed enemy behind her, only to hit nothing.

Channeling chakra to his weights Naruto felt himself become lighter by several hundred pounds; he stabbed his sword into the ground then began to flash around the clearing at random but always circling Fu. With each appearance he would fly through hand signs before hitting his stomach and launching a ball of condensed air at the bewildered Fu. She dodged at best she could but before long a shot clipped her shoulder knocking her off balance and into another shot, then another and another as Naruto took advantage of her inability to dodge. _Sai better finish is part of the plan fast, I don't know how much longer I can keep this up_.

He didn't look it but he was tiring quickly, his muscles were being pushed in ways he hadn't done before in training, his speed was now pushing into mid Jounin territory and he could feel a few of his leg muscles tear before being repaired by the Kyuubi. Naruto started through the familiar set of hand signs before suddenly a loud roar shook the clearing and he was flung back into and through a large tree.

Blearily he made it back to his feet and gazed into the field, there standing in the middle surrounded by broken ground and blood was Fu, now covered in an orange cloud of chakra that slowly began to take the form of a beetle with three scorpion type tails. The second she started to turn towards him he used all of his speed to get away from his landing spot. Less than half a second later he appeared in a tree deeper in the forest on a different side of the clearing.

Half a second after that he was flung back into the clearing with a broken arm, he rolled hard and came up on his feet but obviously in pain, cradling his arm. Through clenched teeth he growled when Fu walked out of his hiding spot, "How did you find me?"

She merely held up her hand and a small cluster of flying insects began to circle it as she regarded them calmly, she was no longer wounded he noticed angrily, "The insects speak to me. They tell me where you hide little leaf."

_Fuck, how can I avoid insects in a forest?!_ Naruto thought furiously and came up with the obvious answer, you can't. He glanced for a second at his broken arm as it got that pins and needles feeling, as if he had let it fall asleep and it was just now awakening. Quickly he jabbed his fingers into his shoulder and the arm went limp. Bubbling out of his skin was the red chakra of the Kyuubi, pulling his bone back in and mending the flesh. After the chakra had receded he jabbed his arm again, fixing protruding bones like that hurt like a bitch. Fortunately, the medical books he was reading taught him how to pinch nerve clusters that shut off feeling temporarily to any limb.

Fu stared with her mouth now hanging open as the Kyuubi's chakra receded, "You're like Fu? You, too, have a monster?"

_Maybe I can convince her to stand down_. "Yes Fu, I'm the holder of the Kyuubi, I'm like you."

Fu merely looked at him as if she had never seen him before, slowly examining every detail, "Fu has never met another, like her."

"I have, Fu there are more like us and if anyone we are the ones who shouldn't fight. This," He patted his stomach for emphasis, "makes us family."

Fu stared longingly at the blond for a moment, "Family?"

Naruto calmly started walking towards her, he knew that if he showed a second of fear she would retract but he also knew the desire for family. "Yes Fu, I can be your brother."

Sadly it seemed that was the wrong thing to say, "Brother? Fu already has a brother; brother will die if Fu fails. Fu has to do as they asked." Fu snapped back into a fighting position and sent a chakra arm flying after the blond. But Naruto was already on the other side of the clearing with his hand pressed to a small black line of ink with Sai at his side. The alabaster root agent had done a good job of using his slowly bleeding ink rats to draw the seal Naruto had specified around the clearing. Small black lines that went through the clearing, through the trees and through the grass glowed blue as Naruto locked eyes with the chakra encased Fu. "I'm sorry Sister."

**Author's notes:**

**RequiemCross: I think that I'll time job after this arc and skip to the shippuden time period.**

**Guest: yes that last chapter was reposted because of some mistakes pointed out to me quickly after posting, so I deleted fixed the mistakes and reposted.**

**O and as always; Guest who read chapter one said "way to make Naruto a pussy" you read one chapter, shut up.**

**Take your guesses folks, what does the Seal do? At this point it could do any number of things so take your guesses and maybe give suggestions. Any reviews are welcome as always, please tell me what you think and if you have any ideas for where you think this story is going please tell me and I might use them as story ideas. See ya later, Peace out.**


	10. Chapter 10

**The Road**

The swordsman momentarily struggled to stay upright, hanging onto his blade and the safety it provided from the torentous wind that had blown away from his compatriot. This moment was all it took for Kakashi inform the others of their part in his plan, "Jump!"

Sakura used a chakra propelled leap over to the ambassador's son as the remaining Kumo Nin grabbed the ambassador. With a surge of chakra they leapt into the air, carrying their charges with them. Once the silver haired Jounin saw them free of the earth's embrace he, too, soared into the air while flashing through hand signs. At the apex of his flight he finished his hand signs and thrust his spread fingers towards the water logged ground. "Raiton; Furasshudoragon" (Flash Dragon)

Sparks formed on his fingers and surged towards the ground in a spiral, quickly wrapping together into a rope that then merged and reformed into a small Chinese style dragon that slammed into the ground. From the point of impact the electricity quickly spread along the ground's wet surface in all directions, the waterfall Nin stiffened upon contact even as he tried to retract his sword from the earth. His eyes rolled and he fell to the ground spasming as the team and their charges landed in small splashes.

Sakura was still cradeling her arm but now that she didn't have a squirming child in her grasp she was using medical chakra to fix the bones, judging by the winces that ran through her face, it wasn't a pleasant experience. Kakashi started to sprint towards their downed opponent, the (Flash Dragon) wasn't a powerful jutsu even with the water to help and it wouldn't paralyze him for much more than a few seconds, he had to finish this now.

"Stop!" The Kumo Nin was running to his right, trying to get Kakashi out of his way. Once he did and Kakashi had stopped he through a kunai at the downed waterfall Nin, it struck true catching the downed shinobi in the temple, but no blood flowed. Instead the figure seemed to destabilize slightly and spears of water, about five feet long, shot out of the body in every direction before stilling. Then the entire body collapsed into a pool of innocent looking water. Kakashi jumped back to the group, "Thanks, what was that?"

The Kumo Nin whipped some water from his forehead and continually glanced around at the forest on either side of the road, "Don't know some variation of the Mizu Bunshin, but he got one of my team with it when this whole thing started. Don't go for the close kill with this son of a bitch."

Kakashi and Sakura nodded as they scanned the trees, Sakura had finished healing her arm and was now flexing her fingers experimentally. It was still a bit sore but movement was within the normal range, unfortunately it had cost almost half of her chakra reserves to do it. Sakura kneeled down in the muddy water and made a show of trying to get a weapon out of a hidden holster on her ankle, the Kumo Nin glanced at her dubiously _She's a lot more useless than I thought_.

But this was exactly the image she wanted everyone to see, when her hands were down by her ankle she very slowly went through hand signs. Any quick movements would attract attention but slow movements people would just dismiss her as clumsy in getting out her weapons. Once done with her hand signs she pressed her finger into the muddy ground until she found the hard earth beneath it, sending out her chakra like sonar that would only bounce off another source of chakra. Kakashi had taught it to her, saying he learned it during the Third Shinobi War. Already she could detect Kakashi, the Kumo-Nin, the ambassador and his son. Pushing out farther she quickly tried to scan the woods, she could only go about 100 feet and wasn't finding anything.

She made a show of grabbing some soldier pills from a hidden pouch in her black kneel length boots and popped it in her mouth, chewing carefully before swallowing the foul tasting pill. The pinket noticed Kakashi looking at her and she subtly signed to him

_No. Detection. Orders?_

Kakashi nodded slowly, it was possible they had scared him off or that he went to help his teammate but that just didn't seem in character for the man. He had seemed so confident and happy about fighting Kakashi and the Sharingan wielding Jounin was sure he hadn't even managed to injure the sword wielding Nin yet. Kakashi signed back to Sakura.

_Stay. Alert._

The slight sound of rushing air was the only warning that Kakashi got of the sword coming to bisect him, fortunately it was enough as he twisted pulling out two kunai and blocking the massive blade that had meant to part him of his legs. The blade was stopped by Kakashi was visibly struggling with the effort to hold it back, leverage wasn't in his favor and the swordsman was no weakling.

Sakura thought quickly, it was possible that it was another water clone and if it was any kill shot would set off the trap with Kakashi too close to get away. _I need a way to tell if it's the original or not!___

Suddenly hit by inspiration she grabbed two more smoke bombs out of her pouch and activated them before throwing them at the struggling duo's feet. The rain had let up that the poison would reach their mouth and nostrils this time, _If it's a clone it won't affect it at all but if it is the original he'll have to retreat. I can give Kakashi-Sensei the antidote after_.

The swordsman looked down at the cloud of purple smoke that was quickly rising up his legs, with a pointed glare at the young medic he lifted back a leg and delivered a front kick to Kakashi's chest launching him to the other side of the road. That was all the proof Sakura needed, if he was a clone he could've kept pushing and ultimately overpowered Kakashi but as the original he had to disengage Kakashi and then retreat. Sakura had no intention of letting him complete step two of his plan.

The rain finally stopped as she, once again, started a barrage of poisoned weapons at the enemy. Forcing him to stay where he was and block the incoming barrage of projectiles, he prepared to once again smack aside the flying weapons with his blade when Sakura kneeled down and ran through some quick hand signs and put her palms to the earth, "Doton; Chikyū supia! (Earth Spear).

Her chakra surged through the earth and under the static shinobi, once behind him it formed the desired jutsu. A stalactite grew from the ground pointed directly at the distracted shinobi's back and dove in for the kill. A second from finishing the older shinobi off Sakura's jutsu was cut in half by a high speed water jet coming from the trees, glancing over she saw a copy of the man crouched on the tree with his hand to his mouth. Apparently the man had made clones to provide support before he had moved in for the attack.

Sakura growled lightly, her chakra reserves were back up due to the soldier pill but they wouldn't last and when it ended her crash would be hard. The cloud of poisonous gas was still close to him and spreading, he would be done with her weapons momentarily and then be free. Without standing Sakura ran through more hand signs and slammed her palms down again, "Doton; Chikyū dōmu! (Earth Dome).

The earth surged once again, just as the older swordsman finished with her thrown weapons, this time closing upon him like the mouth of a great beast to swallow him whole. The Kumo-Nin understood Sakura's plan and slammed his own palms to the ground "Doton; Bokkusu o rokku (Locking Box).

Four walls grew out of the earth surrounding the dome, one was twice as long as the others and when they met the tall wall folded in half closing the box's lid. With any luck it would take too long for him to escape and the poison cloud would finish off the sword wielding shinobi. A screeching sound echoed through the air as Kakashi appeared behind the clone in the tree and thrust his lightning covered fist through its head, dispelling it. Now it was a waiting game. After several minutes it became a deadly case of Schrodinger's Cat, the poison should have killed the shinobi in the box but they couldn't know for sure unless they opened it possibly freeing the swordsman.

The problem was that keeping the earth dome and locking box up constantly sucked chakra away from Sakura and the Kumo-Nin. Both were now beginning to breath heavily as they struggled to keep the wet ground they had made it out of solid. Kakashi struggled to make a plan on how to deal with the trapped nin, striking upon an idea he took out a dozen kunai and carefully focused on creating lightning chakra. Slowly he separated the positive and negative energy of the lightning, he fed the negative energy into the kunai and flung them in a rough semi-circle around the earth constructs. He readied himself and nodded to the exhausted Sakura and Kumo-Nin, gratefully they cut off chakra from the earth and their jutsu ended sagging slowly to the ground.

Once the earth traps had fallen to the ground they could see the swordsman, he was floating a foot off the ground completely encased in water. He had used a reverse water prison to keep himself separate from the poison. With a surge of chakra the water prison exploded outward pushing the poison gas away from the freed Nin.

However, Kakashi was ready. He quickly charged a single kunai with positive electrical energy and flung it towards the center of the circle surrounding the waterfall Nin. Once the kunai hit the ground near the swordsman's feet the positive and negative energies in the kunai called to each other and the circle was filled with lightning. It arced from kunai to kunai, leaving no room to escape as the swordsman screamed, being directly in the path of several bolts of electricity. After the kunai had used all of their charge Kakashi launched a final kunai at the downed and smoking shinobi. It pierced his jaw and embedded into his brain, blood flowed freely.

**Author's Notes:**

**Hey guys, that's the end for this fight, tried to make it a little more varied. Obviously a lot of lightning, earth and water jutsu but one of the combatants is from waterfall, two have earth affinities and there is water everywhere so lightning is a must lol. I tried to make Sakura a bit more useful, I hate writing her as such a failure and want her to actually use Jutsu, tell me what you think of a useful Sakura.**

**Well as always, ask any questions you have and keep suggesting for Fu's fate. I still haven't completely decided although I am leaning towards an answer. I can still be bribed by being asked nicely! :P ….or just being told what you think but whatever, c ya.**


	11. Chapter 11

**The Clearing**

Naruto and Sai were crouched outside a shimmering blue dome of chakra. On the other side was a raging Fu who pounded against the dome as if her life depended on her.

"Sai, Go help, Kakashi and Sakura. I'll keep her in until you return."

Sai seemed to struggle for a moment before turning his blank eyes to the blond, "Yes."

With that he turned and ran into the forest towards the road, they could hear the chirping of Kakashi's Chidori. Sweat was beginning to pour down the blonde's face, he had to surge his chakra in perfect time with Fu's strikes or keep the seal charged with so much chakra it would explode. It could stand short periods of chakra overload but anything longer than a few seconds would receive dire consequences.

"Fu, please stop this!"

"Fu mustn't fail! Fu must save her family!" She took a step back and started pulling on more of her demonic chakra. The cloak glowed brighter and suddenly insects from all over the field began to fly to her. They swarmed around her like a tornado before rapidly constricting upon the green haired girl. The glow of her chakra could still be seen flashing trough the withering mass of insects. When many of the insects departed Fu was no longer recognizable as the girl she had been.

Covering her from head to toe were large insects, their hardened exoskeletons overlapping to make armor. They were also far larger than they had been before, as if they had fed on the 7 tails chakra and grew far beyond their natural state. On her hands large wasps had their legs clamped tightly around her wrist with their large stingers extending inches beyond the girl's closed fists.

Slowly the bugs began to shift as even more chakra flared from the green haired woman and the bugs began to seem to melt and reform together into one large xenomorphic skeleton around her body. When it stopped solid black and green armor seemed to flow down her arms and legs, a large carapace covered her torso, 6 large transparent wings extended from her back and 5 stinger type tails were curled behind her. She opened her mouth, and screamed.

Naruto flew back through several trees and was then implanted firmly into a large rock. He lay still for a moment but then a muscle spasmed and he coughed up large amounts of blood as he fell from the rock's hold. The Kyuubi was working overtime to try to heal his wounds but it would take time, there were shattered bones, torn muscles and ripped tendons all over his body. He laid on the ground coughing out the blood that was gathering in his lunges as the Kyuubi slowly started rearranging his bones back into place.

**The Road**

Sai arrived just in time to see Kakashi finish off their opponent, they looked tired and Kakashi was breathing like his chest hurt but other than that fine and the client was alive.

"Kakashi-Sempai, Naruto-san has the woman contained within a barrier seal but I'm not sure how long it will last. The enemy seems to be a Jinchuurikin."

As if to prove his statement a huge gust of wind, heavy with demonic chakra, flooded the road coming from the clearing where Sai had left his teammate. Acting quickly Sai, Kakashi and Sakura leapt into the trees, Sai lead the way and before long they were at the edge of the tree line. The clearing had almost doubled in size and Naruto was nowhere to be seen. Slowly walking towards the North end of the clearing was a figure in black and green armor with wings and tails. _Definitely not Naruto._

Sai pulled out a scroll and quickly sketched a large bird, with a push of chakra the bird leapt off the page and Sai onto its back as he soared into the sky. Kakashi nodded to Sakura and together they circled around towards the armored Fu. Once in position Kakashi leapt out, landing twenty feet from Fu just as he finished his hand signs, "Katon: Grand Fireball!"

Flames shot from Kakashi's masked face and engulfed the armored figure, Kakashi figured this probably wouldn't harm her but it wasn't supposed to. Just as the fire started to falter a tree swung horizontally and crushed the waterfall girl into the air. She sailed at high speeds as Sakura dropped the tree, Fu ultimately started to fall back towards the earth but before she hit the tree line the wings on her back came to life and held her easily from the earth's embrace.

Suddenly small black and white birds began to dive bomb the flying girl, she swatted ineffectively at them for several seconds before noticing the sizzling sound. The explosive tags on the ink birds' backs exploded engulfing Fu in smoke and flame. _Did it work?_

Sai flew in circles around the cloud of smoke that hung steadily in the air, waiting for confirmation of damage to the Jinchuurikin. Suddenly the smoke exploded outwards blocking Sai's view, a clawed hand surged through the smoke and grabbed the painter's shoulder while another hand aimed at his ink bird, the stinger extending from it stabbed deep into his creation and it returned to regular ink and plummeted to the earth.

The wind swept away the smoke and revealed Fu to have slight cracks in her armor but with a surge of chakra they sealed away and the angered girl spun end over end in midair before delivering a powerful ax kick to the painter's shoulder that sent him plummeting towards the ground at tremendous speeds.

Sai tried to grab at his scroll in his pouch but found his shoulder cracked and unable to move. Just before Sai entered the foliage he was grabbed by two strong arms and both Sai and Kakashi sailed quickly towards the ground. The silver haired Jounin was able to slow down the momentum but they both hit hard grunting and coughing up blood as Sakura rushed over to help them.

She was on the last tree branch and preparing to jump down when she was tackled and flung back into the clearing. The two girls rolled end over end on the ground but ended with Fu standing holding the pinket above her head with both arms before slamming her down to the earth. Sakura screamed as she traveled the short distance at amazing speeds, the earth wasn't able to stop her as she crashed down and created a large dent in the earth. When the dirt cleared Sakura was laid sprawled unconscious with blood dripping from her mouth and several broken bones.

Kakashi and Sai appeared behind Fu and Kakashi quickly charged a Chidori and thrust it at the girl's exposed back while Sai swung his tanto with his good arm and tried to behead the enemy. Demonic chakra exploded out from her stationary form and blocked the Chidori as Fu grabbed Sai's forearm and broke it before kicking him away. She then turned as Kakashi was jumping away and held up her closed fist. The stinger attached to her wrist shot out faster than a bullet and tore through Kakashi's shoulders spinning him and slamming him to the ground, face down.

Fu calmly walked over to the downed Sai, he was sitting up but both his arms hung limply by his side as he watched the armored Jinchuurikin come towards him.

Naruto had finally recovered enough to cover the distance back to the clearing but was still in pained and still bleeding. He reached the clearing just in time to watch as Fu's armored hand palmed the downed Sai's head and rip it from his body. Naruto watched in horror but suddenly Sai's body changed and sagged, running over itself as it flowed down and turned black. _It was an Ink clone, thank Kami._

Fu paused and seemed to consider the ink covering her hands for a second before she turned and started walking towards the crater holding the unconscious Sakura, oblivious to Naruto's presence. Naruto watched in slow motion as Fu approached Sakura, as she reached towards the young medic's neck and just within an inch time seemed to stop and the world turned grey.

"_**So this is it! This is your determination to protect your comrades? Pathetic! That human is about to get her throat ripped out and still you refuse to use my power to save her. Do you know what humans call another who lets their friends die when they could pick up a weapon and fight? TRASH."**_

"_Those who break the rules are trash, but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash."_

"_Do you have someone precious to you?"_

"_Scaredy Cat."_

"Alright Kyuubi, I can't let my desire to prove myself be stronger than my desire to protect my friends. Give me your power and lets end this!"

"_**Finally! Tear her apart Kit!"**_

An unnatural calm descended upon the blond, when he looked up at the still frozen form of Fu his voice was different, completely neutral, "Roger that, target will be eliminated."

Fu's hand was almost against the pink haired girl's skin, one squeeze would be all it would take to tear through her flesh with these claws, but then something happened. A feeling of dread descended upon the clearing, Fu's head shot up as she turned to face Naruto. The blond was standing completely still, all over his body was a thick red chakra that bubbled and twisted, forming fox ears and three tails that waved angrily behind him. Fu's shoulders were starting to shake as she struggled to keep standing; it was as if she were at the bottom of the ocean and all of that weight was settled on her body.

_How can three tails be this strong! Fu has six tails out and should be stronger!_ Fu's thoughts would be correct if each tail were equivalent to the tail of every other tailed beast but this was not the case. Kyuubi wasn't the strongest just because it had the most tails, but also because of the potency of its chakra, three tails of the mighty fox was equivalent to all of the seven tails.

Naruto raised his head and slowly raised his hands, as if in a trance, he went through hand signs without a trace of hurry. When he was done the forest was quiet, as if the wildlife itself was taking a deep breath to whether the incoming storm.

It started as a slight breeze nipping at the blonde's pants and hair, but before long it had grown into a full blown tsunami centered on the blond. Water appeared out of no where and seemed to flow in a slow horizontal whirlpool behind him as any stray water was whipped around him in a tornado. Slowly Naruto raised his hand and pointed at Fu while giving a mental command and the whirlpool behind him collapsed, the water being sucked into the tornado that then blasted off towards Fu at amazing speeds. It swirved and swayed, making it impossible to predict.

She tried to leap out of the way but the suction of the tornado caught her and pulled her in. She screamed and tried to pull on more of her prisoner's chakra but the pain was too much for her to focus, both wind and water were moving at such speeds that they tore through her armor and into her flesh. The tornado was now stationary and held still as Naruto walked up to it, he held up his hand and saw that his fingernails had become claws and saw that he could tell Fu's exact location within the tornado thanks to his demonic eyes.

Slowly he raised his hand and focused more wind and water chakra around his arm, together he moved them faster and faster. Eventually the wind cooled the water to the point where they started together to form ice in the form of a lance pointing out from his fist and flaring out as it went back to his elbow. Pulling back his arm he prepared to thrust in and end his sister Jinchuurikin.

**Author's Notes:**

**Hey guys, sorry this one took so long. Was working on a lot of stuff recently and doing way more writing now that I'm almost ready to go back to college. I know this is a few chapters old but I want to know what you guys think of Naruto going to train under Danzo for whats left of the three year time period until shippuden. He won't become a root drone or anything and won't lose his emotions juts develop a battle mask.**

**I also want to know what level you think he should be at when he comes back at the start of Shippuden, after three years with his growth speed I'm thinking being able to go all out with Kakashi.**

**Thanks everyone please comment.**


	12. Chapter 12

The ground around them was soaked and rapidly ice was starting to form due to the high speed winds from the twister that held a now bleeding a barely conscious Jinchurikin. Fu looked through blurry eyes as the world finally stopped spinning, she could feel something wrapped around her arms and legs, they were pulled taunt even as she sluggishly tried to pull them free. Naruto stood in front of her with a javelin made of ice coating his fist and forearm; she knew what little armor she had left wouldn't be able to stop him now. She had been thrashed and humiliated even drawing on the power of her demon.

Naruto pulled back his fist, the ropes made of water were holding her still, and went to plant his icy weapon within the other containers heart. At the last second a shinobi dressed similarly to Sai with silver hair and a blank Anbu mask knocked his fist off course, it sailed painfully into Fu's shoulder and caused her to scream before she lost consciousness. Naruto's eyes momentarily flashed red, when they returned to blue they kept the slit pupil. He lashed out with his foot and sent the strange shinobi flying into a tree.

The shinobi groaned as the blond advanced on him, as he walked across the drenched earth it would freeze in his wake as more and more wind began to spin around him, leaving deep gouges in the earth. He stopped less than a foot away from the masked nin and prepared to dispatch the interference to his mission when a voice rang out from across the clearing, "Naruto, Stop!"

In the split second Naruto's attention was diverted the downed shinobi sprang to his feet and planted a piece of paper with a seal on it into the blonde's head. The wind stopped and the water suspending Fu splashed to the ground as both Jinchurikin hit the ground. Unlike Fu, Naruto shook his head for a moment, blue eyes returned to normal, and noticed the Konoha Leaf carved into the silver haired nin's mask. _I was about to kill a leaf Nin?_

Struggling mentally as well as physical Naruto stood up and managed to turn, across the clearing was Sai. With him was another shinobi with a blank mask, this one was holding Sai's arms and her hands were glowing green with medical chakra. Two more were applying a seal similar to the one used on Naruto to Fu's forehead before grabbing her under the arms and disappearing into the trees.

Tiredly Naruto stumbled over towards the crater his pink haired teammate was entombed within. When he got there all the breath in his body left as he flung himself into the crater, it had become filled with water and Sakura's mouth and nose were submerged. Quickly grabbing her and pulling her out of the crater he put her on the ground and began administering CPR. If it had been a year ago he would've been happy to put his lips to Sakura's but now all he felt was clammy fear workings its way through his gut as he tried again and again to force the water out of her lungs. Finally after what seemed like a lifetime Sakura arched her back and spat out large quantities of water as Naruto fell onto his but with limbs made of noodles.

_There was no water in that hole, that means that I….I….I filled it with water while using Kyuubi's chakra and almost drown my teammate. Oh, God. I almost stabbed that other Konoha shinobi as well, what was I thinking!_ Looking back Naruto realized that he really hadn't been thinking, once Kyuubi's chakra had started flowing through him he focused only on his target and all other considerations left him. He was a danger to his teammates the way he was but at the same time he had to acknowledge that there would be times he would need to use Kyuubi's chakra, especially with Akatsuki out there. _Jiraiya was right, I need to be trained on how to use Kyuubi's chakra or I'll just end up killing my friends_.

Sakura watched from her back as a medic went over to help Kakashi with a hole in his shoulder and Sai rested against a tree. Looking at Naruto almost broke her heart, the blond shinobi was looking much the worse for wear with ripped and bloodied clothes but it was his eyes that hurt her the most. He seemed like he had just given up something he had tried very hard to achieve.

"Naruto," she waited until she had the blonde's attention, "Thank you for saving me. You really are a great shinobi."

Normally such words would have eased much of the pain that his childhood had wrought on him, all the years of people telling him he could never succeed had compounded a feeling of self-doubt that he constantly hid from everyone behind his determination. However, now it did none of those things, instead it proved to do the opposite. He paled as he stared into her eyes, how could she say that after he had almost killed her? He wasn't a great shinobi, he couldn't protect his friends from the enemy and not from himself.

He needed to be stronger, his motivation had been to retrieve Sasuke but in a moment of clarity he realized that he was being selfish. He didn't want Sasuke back for his own good, he wanted to save his raven haired teammate so things could go back to how they were. Naruto's eyes settled and his face became set in stone, he didn't just want to save Sasuke and he didn't want the status quo to stay the same. He wanted to protect everyone, he needed to be stronger he needed to be the strongest if he was going to protect all of the village from both the enemies without and his own monsters.

He nodded as he stood up and walked over to the silver haired shinobi who was talking quietly with Sai, "Tell Danzo-sama I want to meet with him and that I'll accept his conditions."

Sai's eyes momentarily widened, he hadn't known the blond had been able to figure out who his sponsor was. Never the less Sai and his Root brother turned to the blond and bowed, "Hai, Naruto-Sempai."

**Author's Notes:**

**Short chapter I know, it was really just to wrap up this arc, next is going to be a time skip to Shippuden and so next chapter will be the rescue Gaara arc. I'm also starting to write a few different fanfics and maybe going back to my original. Ontop of all that I have a lot of writing to do for classes which will be starting in four days and a job so I'll be a little slower with updates than I would like. Hopefully I can keep it pretty regular and you guys like my other works too. Thanks, c ya.**


	13. Chapter 13

_Life upon the battle torn plain, like rain within the desert is often short and violent. Nothing in this world of War explains why we fight. Why in this world of plenty we battle over extra._

Naruto closed his journal and tucked it deep into the pocket on his outer thigh. In his second year he had begun keeping a journal full of his musings, Danzo allowed him to keep this small outlet like he did for all of his agents. Sai liked to paint, Naruto wrote, Fu who had become a member of Naruto's Root team after indoctrination had taken to carving. Danzo understood that, despite his heavy conditioning of most of his agents, shinobi needed an outlet or their longtime effectiveness will decline.

Slipping his pencil back into a black kunai holder Naruto stood up. Gone were the flamboyant colors of his coat, now his coat; shirt, and pants were a mixture of black and gray. His movements processed a sort of unnatural grace as he crossed the clearing while nodding to his teammates. The three of them vanished into the night without the slightest noise.

They had left Konoha 13 hours ago, the traitor to Konoha was dealt with and now they had to deliver the proof of completion to Danzo and go about their lives. Sai and Naruto would have 4 hours to sleep before they had to report to the mission briefing with Kakashi and Sakura. Fu would be able to stay on the base; rest and train until her teammates came back for the next mission.

The team re-entered Konoha through the sewers, the passage way was dark but to the root Nin it was a well traversed home. They knew every stop and exactly which bricks to press to open the secret door hidden within the walls. It took several minutes to navigate the maze of tunnels to reach the Root base.

The halls were filled with silent figures wearing the same blank masks that the three young root agents adorned. The other members bowed to the team as they passed. Finally they reached a thick oak door, Sai and Fu kneeled as Naruto knocked quietly on the door.

"Come."

Naruto pushed open the door and dropped to his knee as his commander was revealed, Danzo sat on a chair with candles on a small desk beside him. Naruto held out the scroll containing the missing Nin's head. "The mission has been completed, Danzo-Oji-sama."

Danzo inaudibly sighed; it seemed even with the changes that had occurred to the blond over the last two years couldn't change his desire to nickname his superiors. The old shinobi knew that there was no disrespect in his blond subordinate's actions. The cripple nodded, "turn your report in with the armory then rest up and meet with Kakashi's team.

"Hai, Danzo-sama."

The three nodded and left their commander to dispose of the remains scroll. Naruto and Sai nodded to Fu and turned down a hallway to the right. Once there they changed into their normal clothes and left their blank masks within their lockers.

Several hours later the duo sat patiently in a clearing at training ground 7, they had arrived an hour early and now awaited their teammate and Sensei. Both sat cross-legged on the ground with scroll and brush in hand. Six months into training under Danzo the old man had noticed that the blond was sitting on a bench drawing and discarding seals. It surprised the Root leader to find out that Kakashi had taken what skills he had and increased the budding seal writer's progress immensely.

In those six months Naruto had progressed and surpassed Kakashi; moving on from simple storage seals to more extravagant designs. At that point the blond had been able to lay down a wide zone gravity increase seal with mere momentary distraction from his allies. He would carve four seals into rocks or trees and leave shadow clones to power them in a roughly square formation around the target. Once the seals were activated the target would feel gravity increase 3 fold and be trapped until released or dealt with.

After personal tutoring from Danzo his skill level had again increased at a prodigious level. After a year within Root the blond had taken Sai on as an apprentice, he had remarked that since the artist's main abilities focused on his skills with the brush it would be a shame not to expand.

While Sai's seal marking wasn't anywhere near the level of Naruto's he had still managed to make good progress under the blonde's tutorship.

Sai quietly held up his scroll, with rapidly drying ink, to his teammate and Sempai. The blonde's eyes zeroed in on it and rapidly started dissecting every line and curve. "Tell me what you think is wrong with it."

Sai's lips momentarily thinned, this was what happened whenever his teacher noticed a problem with his seals. Naruto believed that experience was the best teacher and as such he would tell Sai if it was wrong or not but not what the problem is, that he would have to figure out for himself.

The pale artist took back the scroll and began scrutinizing it, 20 minutes later he was almost at the edge of frustration. He couldn't find anything wrong with it, as far as he could tell when activated the seal should be able to absorb chakra if it was in a controlled form like that of a jutsu.

Rolling up the scroll he put it down and picked up another with a different set of brushes. On this scroll was a painting full of vibrant oranges and reds, Naruto had taken him up to the top of the Hokage Monument after discovering his painting habit in the fall. The changing of the trees that surrounded the village and the majesty of the village that rose out of them finally enabled the emotionally challenged root agent to understand why Danzo loved Konoha so much.

While the old man was cold and seldom understanding he did let his emotions bleed through when it was for Konoha. He may have felt slighted that he wasn't chosen for Hokage but years of serving with Hiruzen had made it understandable why the Second had told him that one must always remain in the dark.

Five minutes into filling in the coloring of the trees Sai had a moment of clarity, the secondary chakra absorption relay had been turned too far to the left. Pulling out a new scroll Sai quickly redrew the seal with the corrections and showed the finish project to Naruto, just as Sakura and Kakashi appeared at the edge of the clearing.

The blond gave a small smile and rolled up his own scroll after blowing on the ink, "Well done, Sai."

"Thank you Sempai."

"Naruto, Sai. If art class is over, Jiraiya-sama has finally been convinced to return to test the teams progress."

Naruto didn't even look up as he put away his brushes, "You mean to test my progress and try to convince me that I'm still to weak."

"Yes, well. You won't be fighting alone since I want to see how far Sai and Sakura have progressed when fighting a powerful unfamiliar opponent."

"So we're fighting a Sanin today, Sensei?"

"Yes Sakura, we have to report to Tsunade-sama in an hour for the test."

With a nod the three walked out of the trees and back towards the village.

The sun was slowly crawling across the sky when they reached the familiar white and red tower. When outside Root headquarters Naruto had taken to wearing a similar outfit to his past, black pants and black sandals, his dark green chunin vest and a dark maroon long sleeve shirt. He had taken the chunin exam with Sakura and Sai the year before but neither Sakura nor Sai perfered to wear the vest.

Sakura was wearing a red dress similar to when she was younger with black gloves and knee high boots. Sai had finally forgone the half shirts he had been used to after an unfortunate experience with one Ino Yamanaka. Sai now wore a tight black shirt with only one sleeve that connected to a glove and black combat pants.

Once past the secretary they were let into the Hokage's office, she was sitting there with a slightly more red than average completion, combined with her slightly faster than usual heart beat it was likely she was either ill or emotionally distressed.

"Team 7 Jiraiya is waiting at the Hokage training ground behind the mountain, find him and beat him until he stops moving. Then drag him back here so I can say I told you so."

Naruto and Kakashi chuckled while Sakura smiled and even Sai allowed a brief tightening of his face. It appeared that the old pervert had come back still believing that Naruto had made the wrong decision. Over the last three years, on the record, team 7 and Naruto had completed 76 A ranks 129 B ranks and 37 C ranks. They each had a page in the bingo book of other countries and were often a requested team by clients. The idea that Jiraiya dismissed all of this had apparently enraged the blond Hokage.

"With pleasure, Tsunade-Sama."

"Kakashi, you're allowed to join to. I know of your secret training and I want to see your results."

The silver haired team leader stiffened momentarily before relaxing and giving his Hokage an eye smile, "Hai, Tsunade-sama."

The four members of squad 7 disappeared in a variety of different Shunshin, Tsunade looked up from her paperwork with an absolutely menacing smile before disappearing in her own Shunshin to follow her favorite team. She couldn't wait to see that smug look wiped off her teammate's face.

The Hokage training grounds were similar to the other training grounds but larger and there was a seal that would surround the area in a barrier so the mass amounts of Jutsu thrown around wouldn't affect the village. Jiraiya looked the same as he always had, white hair down to his ankles and red vest.

He sat on top of a training post in the middle of the main clearing, he calmly wrote in his notebook while occasionally giggling even as he ignored the team of shinobi in front of him.

The four had taken the time to travel and discuss their plans to deal with the Sannin. Kakashi figured out a long time ago that Jiraiya would need to be convinced by force that Naruto was getting strong enough without relying solely upon the Kyuubi.

With a slight nod from Kakashi the four glowed momentarily as their weight and restriction seals were deactivated before disappearing with the wind. Jiraiya's head shot up as the four disappeared from his senses. It was obvious they had become strong but he still had lessons to teach them.

**Author's Notes:**

**Naruhana14445: I'm not sure if there will be any pairings in this story it's possible but I don't have a plan for it yet.**

**Serialkeller: Naruto will be stronger than Kakashi but at the same time Kakashi won't be as much of a pushover as he is in cannon. He will be mid kage level at least when not using the Mangekyo. And the Waterfall is an ally to Konoha but in my story they are going through a coup at this time and the conspirators have discovered how to make the other larger villages start fighting each other and had planned to take out the weakest of the winners and take over their lands.**

**Wondering what you guys think of Naruto's skill level and overall the changes that have been made to him. I'll probably have to start writing slower soon because I am not back at school and things will start getting busy.**


	14. Chapter 14

Battles between shinobi are different than most battles, they are often short lived and incredibly quiet. Sai appeared in a blur of movement while Jiraiya remained sitting on the training post, although his book was put away he still appeared completely at ease. All it took was a split second for Sai to draw his tanto, charged with electricity, and swing at the blind spot on the older shinobi's neck. While the pale artist's movements were graceful the toad Sage made them look stumbling and slow as he flipped backwards off the stump while throwing himself into the air with one hand. The blade sailed under his white hair, missing by millimeters before Jiraiya surged chakra down his arm, within his palm obediently formed a bright blue ball that he slammed into Sai's exposed back.

Sai's face twisted into shock and pain while the spinning blue ball dug viciously into his back and through his spine, until he disappeared in an explosion of smoke. When the smoke cleared there was a ruined log covered with active exploding tags, the Sage gave it an almost lazy kick sending the sizzling log shooting into a bush at the edge of the clearing. Sai leapt out of the bush as it became engulfed in flames.

Without taking his eyes off Jiraiya he reached back and patted out a small flame that was licking at his pale shoulder, beside the sheath to his tanto. Charcoal black eyes watched the seemingly carefree Sage as they stood a mere four feet apart. Suddenly both men sagged as if great weights had been put on them, Sai dropped to his knees while Jiraiya merely became slightly slouched. Sai slowly forced his head up and gave the toad sage the minutest of smirks before collapsing into a pool of black ink.

Now free of direct observation Jiraiya pulled out his own brush, _Not bad kid, but I'm not a Seal Master for nothing._ Quickly painting a small seal on the back of his hand the old sage then ran through hand signs that none below Kage level could decipher and the seal glowed blue. Once the blue light died down Jiraiya stood normally and started walking out of the clearing after making a clone with the order to stay and pretend to still be under the effects of the gravity seal.

When the old sage walked out of the clearing his feet would stay off the ground for slightly longer than they should have and he seemed to glide an extra inch before his wooden getas would dig into the ground.

Sai nodded silently, his clone had dispersed shortly after the Naruto clones had activated the gravity seal. Naruto silently nodded back and donned his blank Root mask, if anyone asked he always said it was a mask of his own design based off the Anbu but different so there were no mistakes in identity. The truth was that Root masks had a whole slew of benefits and Naruto wasn't about to go into a fight of this magnitude without every advantage he could get.

If anyone ever got ahold of the masks of anyone on Naruto's squad they would think that the inside had been painted black, but in fact they were just so overlaid with seals that it was impossible to see the white color of the porcelain. Every beneficial seal the young shinobi could find and that could work together without blowing up the mask was placed in it; everything from night-vision and durability to chakra surge techniques. The chakra surge was Naruto's first foray into space time Fuinjutsu, the seal on the mask acted like the nozzle to a hose that could be connected only to its owner's chakra. When the proper hand signs were activated the owner, from anywhere within 60 feet, could flare his chakra and it would be transported to the mask and released in such a way as their affinity defined. Sai's mask would release electricity, Naruto's a torrent of wind blades and water spikes, Fu's would cause the earth to surge up and swallow the mask and by default anyone near it.

It had taken Naruto two years of trial and error to accomplish what he could with the masks and had left him severely drained otherwise he would've put it on all standard Root masks. The seal had been extremely useful on several missions where the mask would be left as bait, Anbu masks were rare and most shinobi were looking for trophies, when the target picked up the mask the chakra surge would be released and they wouldn't even know what had happened.

The almost imperceptible snap of a twig was deafening to the team and Naruto immediately shifted his eyes to the location to find Kakashi's well hidden form. He pointed slowly at his nose and then the direction opposite of the clearing they had left Jiraiya in and then back to the clearing as well. _So he made a clone and escaped thee gravity seal._

Naruto nodded and pressed his pointer finger to the temple of his mask, quickly his blond spiky hair changed to a more earthy deep brown and flattened. He resisted the urge to shutter, no matter how helpful it still felt weird to use that seal to change his hair color even if only temporarily. Mentally counting he pulled his finger down the mask two inches and pressed in again while channeling chakra, activating the battle mode. Once engaged the white porcelain turned to a dark grey camouflaged pattern and the vision through the mask changed slightly now showing 6 small blue flames around the forest. Chakra sensing was always tricky for Naruto with his large amounts of chakra but through research and some pilfered notes from his Father's library had allowed him to create a seal that would allow one to see the location of higher than average chakra sources.

It wasn't perfect as even now he couldn't tell which of the flames belonged to friend or foe, he would only be able to tell once he saw them but at least now he knew the location of all the players. That is until one of the lights disappeared. The light that he had assumed was Jiraiya blinked out of existence about 60 meteres from the ambush point. Naruto had known better than to think that the gravity seal would stop a seal Master but maybe the old man had sent out a clone while he remained behind.

The newly made brunet risked a glance to his right where he knew Sakura was, she slowly shook her head with two fingers pressed deeply within the dirt. The root agent didn't like this, even if it was a clone there was no way that it would've been dispelled by anything unless it was told to and if Jiraiya could get a clone out of the gravity seal then there was no way that he would leave himself trapped.

The only reason the clone would dispel or the original find a way around chakra sensing techniques was if they knew where the team was, their way it was time to change the rules of the game. Flashing handsigns in the Anbu code to his teammates he started to climb the branches of his tree. He didn't like being this flashy but rule number one of being a shinobi to Naruto was never be predictable.

Glancing down from the highest branch Naruto saw that all of his teammates had used the Underground Mole technique and were now safe under the soil. A long series of hand signs later and Naruto pressed his hands to the tree and released his wind chakra in a blunt force wave that sent him rocketing in the air. He began to form more the second he left gravity's embrace and it took him until the apix of his flight to finish the long set of hand signs for his personal Jutsu.

"Fuuton: Fist of the Wind God!"

With chakra levels that one could only expect from the highest rank of Kages and Naruto's naturally strong wind affinity this jutsu was classified by Danzo as "an extremely wasteful army killer."

Naruto gathered his chakra into his fist and enhanced the natural winds at his height, allowing them to twist and turn the blond before redirecting the tremendous winds of the world and enhancing them with massive amounts of chakra as they surged towards the ground.

Jiraiya looked into the air, watching as Naruto soared higher and higher. The others had disappeared underground and normally he would use this opportunity to end the battle with a Swamp of the Underworld but he had a feeling whatever Naruto was up to wouldn't give him the time.

While Jiraiya had never been a sensor type the years had honed his ability to detect large chakra usage with a quick series of hand signs the earth in front and behind the white haired sage rose up like the mouth of a giant beast and swallowed him. Continuing to sense an even greater build up of chakra the white haired pervert flashed through even more hand signs and anxiously slammed his palms to the ground, the once solid dirt immediately softened and turned to mud which allowed the dome to sink deeply into the ground.

Even in within the earth the impact of that type of air was great enough to throw the buried shinobi around in their underground bunkers. Meanwhile Naruto slowly floated to the ground continually blasting air chakra from his feet to slow his decent. Even with his wind powers the now brunet couldn't fly. The dust hadn't even cleared by the time Naruto had reached the ground. All over there were uprooted trees and deep gouges in the ground.

Sakura deep within her, well defined, cavern within the earth had placed her fingers once again into the earth and detected Jiraiya's chakra once he came down into the earth to hide from Naruto's Jutsu. With a smirk and a tightening of her gloves she activated her earth burrowing jutsu and surged through the ground faster than some shinobi could walk.

Kakashi had drilled into her a deep need to master her element as well as possess a wide variety of nin and genjutsu. He had beaten this message into her head when she had thought being skilled in Tsunade's Taijutsu style would be enough. He had merely stayed far away from her and battered her with long range Ninjutsu for hours until she submitted. After that she had spent months with Kakashi increasing her skills.

The slightest trembling in the earth was Jiraiya's only warning before the outside of his earth dome shattered and a pink haired medic was crouching less than a foot from him. With a predatory smirk the pinkette delivered a strong uppercut that sent the perverted sage flying out of the earth and far into the air. He was able to twist in midair and skidded harshly along the ground barely managing to flip over a downed tree before it tripped him. _Tsunade has been teaching her, that would've ended me if I didn't soften the blow with my own chakra_

A slightly muffled chirping was all the warning Jiraiya received before five streams of lightning burst from the ground curving through the air as they screeched towards the aged Sage. Jiraiya shook his head quickly to clear the bells before slamming his hands to the ground and raising four walls of earth around himself. The lightning slammed into the walls, raging against the earth as it blacked and shattered. The lightning broke through half a second later, bringing down the walls. In the middle of the ruble was a slightly burned log, with no sign of the Toad sage.


	15. Chapter 15

Hey everyone, sadly I'm here to apologize for having not written a new chapter for so long. Also I'm going to not be adding a new one for a while unless things change but this semester I have 30 pages of research papers to write so I have to give real life more of my attention. This story is not over however and I will return. Thanks for reading.


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